Edge device and method for sensor-assisted beamforming

ABSTRACT

An edge device includes a first antenna array and a sensor that senses a surrounding area of the edge device. The edge device further includes control circuitry that detects a first user in the surrounding area of the edge device sensed by the sensor. The control circuitry tracks the detected first user in the surrounding area of the edge device based on the sensor and control the first antenna array to direct a first beam of radio frequency (RF) signal having a signal strength greater than a first threshold in a first direction of the first user being tracked based on the sensor for high-performance communication.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS/INCORPORATION BY REFERENCE

This Patent Application makes reference to, claims priority to, claimsthe benefit of and is a Continuation-in-part Application of U.S. patentapplication Ser. No. 17/444,219, filed on Aug. 2, 2021.

This application further makes reference to U.S. application Ser. No.17/341,978, filed on Jun. 8, 2021.

Each of the above reference applications is hereby incorporated hereinby reference in its entirety.

FIELD OF TECHNOLOGY

Certain embodiments of the disclosure relate to wireless communication.More specifically, certain embodiments of the disclosure relate to anedge device and a method for sensor-assisted beamforming foraccelerating user equipment (UE) specific beamforming.

BACKGROUND

Wireless telecommunication in modern times has witnessed the advent ofvarious signal transmission techniques and methods, such as beamformingand beam steering techniques, for enhancing the capacity of radiochannels. Latency and the high volume of data processing are consideredprominent issues with next-generation networks, such as 5G. Currently,the use of edge computing in the next generation networks, such as 5Gand upcoming 6G, is an active area of research, and many benefits havebeen proposed, for example, faster communication between vehicles,pedestrians, and infrastructure and other communication devices. Forexample, it is proposed that proximity of conventional edge devices touser equipment (UEs) may likely reduce the response delay usuallysuffered by UEs while accessing the traditional cloud. However, thereare many open technical challenges for successful and practical use ofedge computing in modern networks, especially in 5G or the upcoming 6Genvironment.

In a first example, one major technical challenge of the mmWavebeamforming is signal attenuation, which adversely impacts low latencyand high data rate requirements. For example, generally, mmWave signalsmay be easily blocked by atmospheric conditions such as rain or isabsorbed by oxygen, which is one reason why it only works at shortranges. Unlike traditional antennas that broadcast in every direction,so other communication devices can wirelessly connect with them,5G-enabled antennas do not broadcast but points a beam at one object andmay make an individual connection to one or more objects. This increasesthe complexity of antennas in user equipment (UE), base stations, andother network nodes (e.g., repeater devices, small cell, etc.) asantennas are required to be designed to handle the complexity of aiminga beam at a target object in a crowded cellular environment with plentyof obstructions. Current positioning methods used to determine ageographical location of a target device, such as a UE, are coarse(having more than 3 to 10 meters error) and add to the ever-increasingsignaling load among various network nodes to estimate position. Forexample, in 3GPP release 16, it is planned to achieve less than 3 meterspositioning accuracy for some use cases. In certain scenarios, thecomplexity increases manifold when the target object is in motion andits location changes rapidly. Thus, in such scenarios, faster decisionsto alter the beam become necessary to ensure the best performance.Moreover, the performance of UEs varies with the location of the UEs andtheir proximity to a relay or service side of a conventional repeater.This is because the usual method of wide beam access, although it worksin proximity to the conventional repeater device but suffers as a givenUE, moves at greater distances from the conventional repeater device,especially for mmWave communication due to signal attenuation.

In a second example, Quality of Experience (QoE) is another open issue,which is a measure of a user's holistic satisfaction level with aservice provider (e.g., Internet access, phone call, or other carriernetwork-enabled services). The challenge is how to ensure seamlessconnectivity as well as QoE without significantly increasinginfrastructure cost, which may be commercially unsustainable withpresent solutions.

Further limitations and disadvantages of conventional and traditionalapproaches will become apparent to one of skill in the art throughcomparison of such systems with some aspects of the present disclosureas set forth in the remainder of the present application with referenceto the drawings.

BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE DISCLOSURE

An edge device and a method for sensor-assisted beamforming foraccelerating user equipment (UE) specific beamforming for highperformance and reliable communication, substantially as shown in and/ordescribed in connection with at least one of the figures, as set forthmore completely in the claims.

These and other advantages, aspects and novel features of the presentdisclosure, as well as details of an illustrated embodiment thereof,will be more fully understood from the following description anddrawings.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a network environment diagram illustrating various componentsof an exemplary communication system with a central cloud server and aplurality of edge devices for sensor-assisted beamforming, in accordancewith an exemplary embodiment of the disclosure.

FIG. 2A is a block diagram illustrating different components of anexemplary edge device for sensor-assisted beamforming, in accordancewith an embodiment of the disclosure.

FIG. 2B is a diagram illustrating an antenna array of an edge device, inaccordance with an embodiment of the disclosure.

FIG. 2C is a diagram illustrating an antenna array of an edge device, inaccordance with another embodiment of the disclosure.

FIG. 3A is a diagram illustrating a first exemplary scenario forimplementation of the edge device for high performance and reliablecommunication, in accordance with an embodiment of the disclosure.

FIG. 3B is a diagram illustrating a second exemplary scenario forimplementation of the edge device and method for sensor-assistedbeamforming for high performance and reliable communication, inaccordance with an embodiment of the disclosure.

FIG. 3C is a diagram illustrating a third exemplary scenario forimplementation of the edge device and method for sensor-assistedbeamforming for high performance and reliable communication, inaccordance with an embodiment of the disclosure.

FIGS. 4A, 4B, and 4C, collectively, is a flowchart that illustrates anexemplary method for sensor-assisted beamforming for accelerating userequipment (UE) specific beamforming for high performance and reliablecommunication, in accordance with an embodiment of the disclosure.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart that illustrates an exemplary method forsensor-assisted beamforming for accelerating user equipment (UE)specific beamforming for high performance and reliable communication, inaccordance with another embodiment of the disclosure.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE DISCLOSURE

Certain embodiments of the disclosure may be found in an edge device anda method for sensor-assisted beamforming. Beneficially, the edge devicecomprises a sensor that is employed intelligently for accelerating userequipment (UE) specific beamforming for high performance and reliablecommunication. The edge device has a multi-function capability ofsensing, tracking, and beamforming that work in synchronization suchthat a beam of radio frequency (RF) signal having a signal strengthgreater than a threshold can be directed towards a direction of a useror a location of the user, where the user is tracked by the sensor evenif the user is in motion and change its location rapidly. The disclosededge device executes sensing, tracking, and beamforming cooperatively inreal-time or near real-time that enables making faster and accuratedecisions to alter the beams as per need without any increase insignaling load on a cellular network and further ensures the bestperformance consistently in terms of high throughput data rate as wellas ultra-reliable communication as compared to existing systems.Further, the edge device and the method of the present disclosure ensureseamless connectivity as well as QoE while reducing the infrastructurecost due to effective management and concentration of radiation patternof the beams of RF signals having higher signal strength due to precisesensing, tracking, and beamforming functions that work in cooperation.For instance, existing road-side units (RSU) or repeater devicesdeployed indoors or outdoors need to be deployed near each other (say Xmeters apart) to provide coverage in an area due to the issues of signalattenuation in mmWave communication. This is because the usual method ofwide beam access, although it works in proximity to the conventionalrepeater device but suffers as a given UE, moves at greater distancesfrom the conventional repeater device, especially for mmWavecommunication due to signal attenuation. On the contrary, the use of thedisclosed edge device reduces the number of such devices that need to bedeployed to provide coverage in the same area by more than 30-50 percent. This is because of the cooperative operation of the sensing,tracking, and beamforming functions that seamless connectivity withhigher signal strength is provided to the moving UE by dynamic andaccurate directing of the beam of RF signal in a specific radiationpattern towards the users (i.e., people) tracked by the sensor. In thefollowing description, reference is made to the accompanying drawings,which form a part hereof, and in which is shown, by way of illustration,various embodiments of the present disclosure.

FIG. 1 is a network environment diagram illustrating various componentsof an exemplary communication system with a central cloud server and aplurality of edge devices, in accordance with an exemplary embodiment ofthe disclosure. With reference to FIG. 1 , there is shown a blockdiagram 100 of a network environment that includes a central cloudserver 102, a plurality of edge devices 104, one or more user equipment(UEs) 106, and a plurality of base stations 108. There is further showna plurality of different WCNs 110, such as a first WCN 110A of a firstservice provider and a second WCN 110B of a second service provider.There is also shown a first user 112A and a second user 112B.

The central cloud server 102 includes suitable logic, circuitry, andinterfaces that may be configured to communicate with the plurality ofedge devices 104, the one or more UEs 106, and the plurality of basestations 108. In an example, the central cloud server 102 may be aremote management server that is managed by a third party different fromthe service providers associated with the plurality of different WCNs110. In another example, the central cloud server 102 may be a remotemanagement server or a data center that is managed by a third party, orjointly managed, or managed in coordination and association with one ormore of the plurality of different WCNs 110. In an implementation, thecentral cloud server 102 may be a master cloud server or a mastermachine that is a part of a data center that controls an array of othercloud servers communicatively coupled to it for load balancing, runningcustomized applications, and efficient data management. The connectivityenhanced database 102A may be a low-latency database, for example,“DynamoDB,” “Scylla,” or other proven and known low-latency databasesthat can handle one or more million transactions per second on a singlecloud server. The connectivity enhanced database 102A may be anintelligent and learned database, which specifies wireless connectivityenhanced information for a surrounding area of each of the plurality ofedge devices 104 independent of a plurality of different WCN 110 ofdifferent service providers. An exemplary training phase to generate theconnectivity enhanced database 102A has been provided and explained indetail in the U.S. application Ser. No. 17/341,978, filed on Jun. 8,2021.

Each edge device of the plurality of edge devices 104 such as the edgedevice 104A may be one of an XG-enabled edge communication device, anXG-enabled edge repeater device, an XG-enabled relay device, anXG-enabled customer premise equipment (CPE), an XG-enabled ceiling unit,an XG-enabled small cell, or an XG-enabled road-side unit (RSU), wherethe term “XG” refers to 5G or 6G communication. In an implementation,each edge device or some of the plurality of edge devices 104 includessuitable logic, circuitry, and interfaces that may be configured tocommunicate with the central cloud server 102. In such animplementation, the edge device 104A may be controlled out-of-band, forexample, in a management plane, by the central cloud server 102. In animplementation, some of the edge devices of the plurality of edgedevices 104 may be deployed at a fixed location, while some may beportable. For example, an edge device may be a fixed wireless access(FWA) device, a ceiling unit deployed indoors, a repeater devicedeployed at a fixed location indoors or outdoors, a small cell, or a CPEor a portable repeater device.

Each of one or more UEs 106, such as a first UE 106A and a second UE106B, may correspond to telecommunication hardware used by an end-userto facilitate communications. Alternatively stated, each of the one ormore UEs 106 may refer to a combination of a mobile equipment andsubscriber identity module (SIM). Each of the one or more UEs 106 may bea subscriber of at least one of the plurality of different WCNs 110.Examples of the one or more UEs 106 may include but are not limited to,a smartphone, a vehicle, a virtual reality headset, an augmented realitydevice, an in-vehicle device, a wireless modem, or any other customizedhardware for telecommunication.

Each of the plurality of base stations 108 may be a fixed point ofcommunication that may communicate information, in the form of aplurality of beams of RF signals, to and from communication devices,such as the one or more UEs 106 and the plurality of edge devices 104.Multiple base stations corresponding to one service provider may begeographically positioned to cover specific geographical areas. In animplementation, each of the plurality of base stations 108 may be a gNB.In another implementation, the plurality of base stations 108 mayinclude eNBs, Master eNBs (MeNBs) (for non-standalone mode), and gNBs.

Each of the plurality of different WCNs 110 is owned, managed, orassociated with a mobile network operator (MNO), also referred to as amobile carrier, a cellular company, or a wireless service provider thatprovides services, such as voice, SMS, MMS, Web access, data services,and the like, to its subscribers, over a licensed radio spectrum. Eachof the plurality of different WCNs 110 may own or control elements ofnetwork infrastructure to provide services to its subscribers over thelicensed spectrum, for example, 4G LTE or 5G spectrum (FR1 or FR2). Forexample, the first base station 108A or the first UE 106A may becontrolled, managed, or associated with the first WCN 110A, and thesecond base station 108B or the second UE 106B may be controlled,managed, or associated with the second WCN 110B different from the firstWCN 110A. The plurality of different WCNs 110 may also include mobilevirtual network operators (MVNO).

Beneficially, the plurality of edge devices 104, such as the edge device104A, significantly reduces the issue of signal attenuation, whichadversely impacts low latency and high data rate requirements. The edgedevice 104A includes a sensor that is configured to perform sensing andtracking of a location of a user in motion, such as the first user 112Acarrying the first UE 106A, accurately with a centimeter-level accuracy(e.g., less than 5-10 cm error magnitude) instead of a coarse levelaccuracy in existing systems. Accordingly, a radiation pattern of anantenna array of the edge device 104A may be calibrated to communicate abeam of RF signal in a specific radiation pattern that is most suitedfor a defined period. In an example, if the first user 112A is movingaway from the edge device 104A, a pencil beam may be employed forcommunication having signal strength greater than the threshold so thatboth uplink and downlink communication may be maintained (or increase)at the multigigabit data rate. The radiation pattern may be dynamicallyupdated based on the ongoing changes in the location or position of thefirst user 112A carrying the first UE 106A as it moves for consistenthigh-performance and ultra-reliable communication. As the beam of RFsignal is in a concentrated or targeted form and directed precisely onthe ongoing tracked location of the first user 112A, mmWavecommunication occurs at extended ranges than usual short ranges and therange and radiation pattern can be changed dynamically as per thetracked location of the first user 112A. Furthermore, the antenna array(e.g., a first antenna array 210A of FIG. 2A) of the edge device 104A isdesigned and configured to operate in cooperation with the sensor toreduce the complexity of aiming a beam at a target object in a crowdedcellular environment with plenty of obstructions, without increasing anysignaling load among various network nodes. The edge device 104A makesintelligent use of its sensor to sense and track one or more users, suchas the first user 112A and the second user 112B (i.e., senses and trackspeople who may carry corresponding UEs) precisely instead of a UE alone(such as first UE 106A or the second UE 106B), which is then used fordirecting one or more beams in the direction of the tracked one or moreuser, such as the first user 112A and the second user 112B to reachtheir locations. In other words, the standard UE position estimationmethods in 4G LTE and 5G NR are time-consuming and involve multiplesignaling over the cellular network, for example, as specified in 3GPPspecifications release 16. The disclosed edge device may be a repeaterdevice that not only extends the range and coverage of a base station ora small cell but also reduces latency and enables quick change of beamsand radiation patterns to maintain consistent connectivity with the oneor more UE carried by one or more users based on sensing and tracking ofthe one or more users. Thus, the edge device 104A ensures fasterdecisions due to sensor-assisted beamforming function to alter the beamdirection, angle, and shape dynamically and rapidly to ensure the bestperformance and QoE by providing seamless connectivity withoutincreasing infrastructure cost. Furthermore, the use of sensor inbeamforming further reduces (i.e., optimizes) the power usage of theedge device 104A, which may be otherwise employed for over the networksignaling as in standard UE position estimation methods known in theart.

In an implementation, the edge device 104A may be connected to thecentral cloud server 102. In such an implementation, beneficially, theplurality of edge devices 104 further improves coverage in 5G NRcellular network deployments without any adverse user experience to meetQoS for 5G NR communication. Moreover, the central cloud server 102 andthe plurality of edge devices 104 exhibit a decentralized model that notonly brings cloud computing capabilities closer to UEs to reduce latencybut also manifests several known benefits for various service providersassociated with the plurality of different WCNs 110. For example,backhaul traffic is reduced by provisioning content at the edge,computational resources are distributed geographically in differentlocations (e.g., on-premises mini cloud, central offices, customerpremises, etc.,) depending on the use case requirements and reliabilityof a network is improved by distributing content between edge devicesand the centralized cloud server 102. Apart from these and other knownbenefits (or inherent properties) of edge computing, the central cloudserver 102 and the plurality of edge devices 104 improve and solve manyopen issues related to the convergence of edge computing and modernwireless networks, such as 5G or upcoming 6G. The central cloud server102 significantly improves the beam management mechanism of 5G new radio(NR), true 5G, and creates a platform for upcoming beyond 5G and 6Gcommunications, to achieve low latency and high data rate requirements.

FIG. 2A is a block diagram illustrating different components of anexemplary edge device, in accordance with an embodiment of thedisclosure. FIG. 2A is explained in conjunction with elements from FIG.1 . With reference to FIG. 2A, there is shown a block diagram 200 of theedge device 104A with various components. The edge device 104A is one ofthe plurality of edge devices 104 (FIG. 1 ). The edge device 104A has adonor side 202A facing towards the plurality of base stations 108, suchas the first base station 108A and the second base station 108B (of FIG.1 ). The edge device 104A also has a service side 202B facing towardsone or more users (e.g., the first user 112A) who may be carrying theone or more UEs 106 (e.g., the first UE 106A). In an implementation, theedge device 104A may include a control section 204 and a front-end radiofrequency (RF) section, which may include one or more donor antennaarrays 206 and an uplink chain 208 at the donor side 202A, and furtherone or more service antenna arrays 210 and a downlink chain 212 at theservice side 202B. The control section 204 may be communicativelycoupled to the front-end RF section, such as the one or more donorantenna arrays 206, the uplink chain 208, the one or more serviceantenna arrays 210, and the downlink chain 212. The front-end RF sectionsupports millimeter-wave (mmWave) communication as well communication ata sub 6 gigahertz (GHz) frequency. The control section 204 may furtherinclude control circuitry 214 and a memory 216. There is further shown asensing function (SF) 218 and a beamforming function (BF) 220. In someimplementation, the edge device 104A may further include a sensor 222and a sensor data memory 224 that are communicatively coupled to thecontrol circuitry via a Serial Peripheral Interface (SPI) 226. In someimplementations, a separate sensor, such as the sensor 222 and thesensor data memory 224, may not be provided, and a portion of a serviceantenna array, such as the first antenna array 210A, of the one or moreservice antenna arrays 210 may be configured for sensing a surroundingarea of the edge device 104A.

The edge device 104A includes suitable logic, circuitry, and interfacesthat may be configured to communicate with one or more base stations ofthe plurality of base stations 108, one or more UEs 106, and the centralcloud server 102. The edge device 104A may be further configured tocommunicate with the one or more UEs 106 and other edge devices of theplurality of edge devices 104. In accordance with an embodiment, theedge device 104A may support multiple and a wide range of frequencyspectrum, for example, 3G, 4G, 5G, and 6G (including out-of-bandfrequencies). The edge device 104A may be at least one of an XG-enabledrepeater device, an XG-enabled ceiling unit, an XG-enabled small cell,an XG-enabled road-side unit (RSU), an XG-enabled relay device, anXG-enabled vehicle-mounted edge device, where the term “XG” refers to 5Gor 6G radio communication. Other examples of the edge device 104A mayinclude, but is not limited to, a 5G wireless access point, anevolved-universal terrestrial radio access-new radio (NR) dualconnectivity (EN-DC) device, a Multiple-input and multiple-output(MIMO)-capable repeater device, or a combination thereof deployed at afixed location.

The one or more donor antenna arrays 206 may be provided at the donorside 202A of the edge device 104A and may be communicatively coupled toan uplink chain 208. The one or more service antenna arrays 210 may beprovided at the service side 202B and may be communicatively coupled tothe downlink chain 212. Each of the uplink chain 208 and the downlinkchain 212 may include a transceiver chain, for example, a cascadingreceiver chain and a cascading transmitter chain, each of whichcomprises various components for baseband signal processing or digitalsignal processing. For example, the cascading receiver chain has variouscomponents, such as a set of low noise amplifiers (LNA), a set ofreceiver front end phase shifters, and a set of power combiners, for thesignal reception (not shown here for brevity). Similarly, the cascadingtransmitter chain comprises various components for baseband signalprocessing or digital signal processing, such as a set of powerdividers, a set of phase shifters, a set of power amplifiers (PA).

In an implementation, the one or more service antenna arrays 210 at theservice side 202B may be configured to execute mmWave communication withthe one or more UEs 106 within its communication range. In animplementation, the one or more service antenna arrays 210 also supportsmultiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) operations and may be configuredto execute MIMO communication with the one or more UEs 106 within itscommunication range. The MIMO communication may be executed at a sub 6gigahertz (GHz) frequency or at mmWave frequency for 5G NRcommunication. Each of the one or more donor antenna arrays 206 and theone or more service antenna arrays 210 may be one of an XG phased-arrayantenna panel, an XG-enabled antenna chipset, an XG-enabled patchantenna array, or an XG-enabled servo-driven antenna array, where the“XG” refers to 5G or 6G. Examples of implementations of the XGphased-array antenna panel include, but are not limited to, a linearphased array antenna, a planar phased array antenna, a frequencyscanning phased array antenna, a dynamic phased array antenna, and apassive phased array antenna.

The control circuitry 214 may be communicatively coupled to the memory216 and the front-end RF section. The control circuitry 214 may beconfigured to execute various operations of the edge device 104A. Thecontrol circuitry 214 may be configured to control various components ofthe front-end RF section, such as the one or more donor antenna arrays206 and the uplink chain 208 at the donor side 202A; and the one or moreservice antenna arrays 210 and the downlink chain 212 at the serviceside 202B. The edge device 104A may be a programmable device, where thecontrol circuitry 214 may execute instructions stored in the memory 216.Examples of the implementation of the control circuitry 214 may includebut are not limited to an embedded processor, a baseband processor, aField Programmable Gate Array (FPGA), a microcontroller, a specializeddigital signal processor (DSP), a control chip, a Reduced InstructionSet Computing (RISC) processor, an Application-Specific IntegratedCircuit (ASIC) processor, a Complex Instruction Set Computing (CISC)processor, and/or other processors, or state machines.

The memory 216 may be configured to store values calculated by thecontrol circuitry 214. Examples of the implementation of the memory 216may include, but are not limited to, a random access memory (RAM), adynamic random access memory (DRAM), a static random access memory(SRAM), a processor cache, a thyristor random access memory (T-RAM), azero-capacitor random access memory (Z-RAM), a read-only memory (ROM), ahard disk drive (HDD), a secure digital (SD) card, a flash drive, cachememory, and/or other non-volatile memory. It is to be understood by aperson having ordinary skill in the art that the control section 204 mayfurther include one or more other components, such as an analog todigital converter (ADC), a digital to analog (DAC) converter, a cellularmodem, and the like, known in the art, which are omitted for brevity.

In an implementation, the sensing function 218 may be a function, suchas a feature, which, when activated, the sensing of objects in thesurrounding area of the edge device 104A is initiated. In an example,the sensing function 218 may be implemented as a sensing circuit thatmay be activated and deactivated. For example, when deactivated, theedge device 104A may be in a power-saving mode.

In an implementation, the beamforming function 220 may be a function,such as a feature, used to execute beamforming to direct one or morebeams of RF signals to one or more target objects in the surroundingarea in one or more specific radiation patterns. In an example, thebeamforming function 220 may be activated and deactivated. For example,when deactivated, the edge device 104A may be in a power-saving mode.

In operation, the sensor 222 may be configured to sense a surroundingarea of the edge device 104A. In an implementation, the controlcircuitry 214 may be configured to activate the sensing function 218 tosense the surrounding area of the edge device 104A. The edge device 104Amay be deployed indoors or outdoors. The sensing of the surrounding areamay be done to determine what objects are present in the surroundingarea of the edge device 104A around the deployed location of the edgedevice 104A.

In accordance with an embodiment, the sensor 222 may be a sensing Radar(e.g., a Frequency-Modulated Continuous Wave (FMCW) radar), an imagesensing device, a combination of the sensing Radar and the image sensingdevice, or an object detection sensor. The edge device 104A may be amulti-function edge device that comprises the sensor 222 communicativelycoupled to the control circuitry 214, and where the sensing function 218may be activated in the sensor 222 to sense the surrounding area of theedge device 104A. Other examples of the sensor 222 may include, but maynot be limited to, a Lidar or other mmWave sensors. The sensor 222 maybe a separate sensor provided and integrated with the edge device 104A.The sensed data of the surrounding area of the edge device 104A may bestored at the sensor data memory 224. The sensor 222 may becommunicatively coupled to the control circuitry 214 via the SPI 226.The SPI 226 may be a full-duplex bus interface used to send data betweenthe control section 204 (e.g., a microcontroller or DSP, such as thecontrol circuitry 214) and other peripheral components such as thesensor 222 and a modem, for example, a 5G modem. The SPI 226 supportsvery high speeds and throughput and is suitable for handling a hugeamount of data. In an example, the sensor 222 may be a mmWave sensorthat manifests high sensitivity to motion, insensitivity to weather andlow light, ability to operate at high velocity, and high-rangeresolution. For example, scene parameters of the sensor 222 may includea range resolution of about 4.4 centimeters (i.e., providescentimeter-level accuracy), maximum unambiguous range of about 9 meters,a maximum radial velocity of about 1 meter/sec, a radial velocityresolution of 0.12 meters/sec, and an azimuth resolution of about 14.5degrees. It is to be understood that such scene parameters are for anexemplary implementation and may vary depending on otherimplementations; for example, the maximum unambiguous range may be morethan 9 meters, such as 9-30 meters, and the like, without limiting thescope of the disclosure.

In a case where the sensor 222 is the sensing Radar or the objectdetection sensor, the sensing may be executed by communicating a radiofrequency (RF) wave that hits the surrounding objects of the edge device104A and detects the energy that is reflected from such objects. The RFwave may be in mmWave signal frequency or an out-of-band frequency thatis different from the frequency used to communicate data streams in thecellular network of the plurality of different WCNs 110. In animplementation, the RF wave may be a chirp signal with a startingfrequency in the mmWave frequency range. The chirp signal may have aplurality of chirp parameters. In an example, the plurality of chirpparameters may include a start frequency of about 60 Gigahertz (GHz), aslope of about 70 Megahertz per unit sample (MHz/us), samples per chirpof about 256 samples, chirps per frame of about 32, a sampling rate ofabout 5.2 mega samples per second (Msps), sweep bandwidth of about 3.44GHz, and frame periodicity of about 250 milliseconds (msec). In a casewhere the sensor 222 is the image sensing device, such as a camera, aninfrared sensor, time-of-flight camera (ToF camera), a view of thesurrounding area of the edge device 104A may be captured. In a casewhere the sensor 222 is the combination of the sensing Radar and theimage sensing device, the use of RF wave along with captured view fromthe image sensing device may complement each other for object detectionand identification in a faster and accurate manner. In some cases, othertypes of sensors, such as other object detection sensors, to sense thesurrounding environment may be used. For example, ultrasonic sensors maybe used to send a burst of sound waves towards surrounding objects, andwhich may reflect sound waves back to the sensor 222, which then may beused to determine the distance of one or more objects from the edgedevice 104A in the surrounding area and thus become aware of thelocation of the one or more objects in the surrounding area.

In accordance with an embodiment, the sensing of the surrounding area ofthe edge device 104A is executed in a first frequency by the sensor 222that is different from a second frequency used to direct the first beamof RF signal from the first antenna array 210A. In other words, thecommunication of the RF wave for sensing purposes may be done in thefirst frequency, for example, an out-of-band frequency, which isdifferent from the frequency (e.g., an in-band frequency) of the firstbeam of RF signal that carries data steam to the first UE 106A. The useof mutually isolated frequencies is employed to avoid any unwantedsignal interference and signal attenuation. In one implementation, thesensing may be processed by the same RF and base-band processor (such asthe control circuitry 214), which executes the beamforming. In anotherimplementation, the sensing and the beamforming operations only sharethe baseband processor or only RF circuits. In yet anotherimplementation, each of the sensing function 218 (i.e., sensing of thesurrounding area) and the beamforming function 220 (to executebeamforming) has its own radio and own baseband processor (i.e., aseparate baseband processor or separate control circuitry).

In accordance with an embodiment, the control circuitry 214 may befurther configured to generate a three-dimensional (3D) environmentrepresentation of the surrounding area of the edge device 104A. In anexample, the 3D environmental representation may be generated in theform of a point cloud. The 3D environment representation may begenerated based on the sensing of the surrounding area of the edgedevice 104A. The 3D environmental representation may be a representationof a surrounding environment of the edge device 104A that indicates aplurality of mobile and stationary objects surrounding the edge device104A. For example, the 3D environmental representation may indicate anypossibility of signal blockages or fading, road condition, trafficinformation, and current weather condition.

The control circuitry 214 may be configured to detect the first user112A in the surrounding area of the edge device 104A sensed by thesensor 222. One or more users, such as the first user 112A, may bedetected in the surrounding area based on the sensing executed by thesensor 222. In an example, the control circuitry 214 may be furtherconfigured to detect an object as a human user by detecting a contour ofthe object, for example, one or more different contour or shapes of ahuman being may be used to detect a human user, which isless-computational resource intensive process of detecting a human user.The first user 112A may be carrying one or more UEs, such as the firstUE 106A.

In another example, the control circuitry 214 may be further configuredto detect one or more objects by use of one or more object detection andidentification algorithms. In an implementation, the one or more objectdetection and identification algorithms may be custom designed forselected objects, for example, buildings, corners of buildings, streetcross-sections, street corners and turns, human user, vehicle, types ofvehicle, like two-wheeler, three-wheeler, or four-wheeler etc. Theobjects that are relevant and needs to be detected and tracked may bedetermined and the control circuitry 214 may employ uniquecharacteristic features associated with each of those objects to detectand identify those objects. The detection and identification of allobjects may not be required. Only the objects that may influence theradio frequency (RF) wave reflection, signal obstruction, orconnectivity to the one or more UEs if present in the surrounding areaof the edge device 104A, may be selected exclusively for objectdetection and identification. In yet another example, the controlcircuitry 214 may be further configured to detect one or more objects byuse of one or more object detection and identification known in the art.

The control circuitry 214 may be further configured to track thedetected first user 112A in the surrounding area of the edge device 104Abased on the sensor 222. Irrespective of a type of the sensor 222 used,i.e., whether the sensor 222 is the sensing radar, the image sensingdevice, the object detection sensor, or their combination, the controlcircuitry 214 uses sensed information by the sensor 222 to track thedetected first user 112A in the surrounding area of the edge device104A. A current location and any movement and corresponding changes inthe location coordinates or position of the detected first user 112A maybe tracked.

In accordance with an embodiment, the control circuitry 214 may befurther configured to track a location of the first UE 106A in motionfrom the edge device 104A. Based on the continuous sensing, the controlcircuitry 214 may track the location of the first UE 106A in motion fromthe edge device 104A. Such tracking may be a local tracking using thecommunicated RF wave emitted by the edge device 104A that detects thefirst UE 106A in terms of a current distance and a current angle fromthe edge device 104A. As the location coordinates of the edge device104A are known, the location coordinates of the first UE 106A may bederived without increasing any signaling load on the network. In a casewhere the communicated RF wave is emitted in a mmWave frequency, theaccuracy of tracking is increased due to the high sensitivity of themmWave frequency to motion. Moreover, the tracking is insensitive to lowlight or weather and manifest a centimeter-level accuracy in thetracking of the location of the first UE 106A. In some implementations,the tracking of the location of the first UE 106A in motion may befurther enhanced by correlating the tracking information with thegenerated 3D environment representation of the surrounding area of theedge device 104A or the input from the image sensing device whenemployed.

The control circuitry 214 may be further configured to control the firstantenna array 210A to direct a first beam of radio frequency (RF) signalhaving a signal strength greater than a first threshold in a firstdirection of the first user 112A being tracked based on the sensor 222.The control circuitry 214 may be further configured to executebeamforming to direct the first beam of RF signal having the signalstrength greater than the threshold towards the first user 112A who'slocation may be tracked. It is comparatively low-computational resourceintensive task to track a bigger object like the first user 112A than amuch smaller object, like a smartphone, such as the first UE 106A.Moreover, as the first user 112A may be carrying the first UE 106A, thefirst UE 106A and the first user 112A may be considered co-located forbeamforming purposes. This simplifies the beamforming to direct thefirst beam of RF signal concentrated towards the direction of the firstuser 112A to reach the first user 112A. In other words, the first beamof RF signal directed towards the first user 112A also illuminates thefirst UE 106A to enable RF communication, for example, in 5G NRfrequencies (either sub-6 GHz or mmWave frequencies). The edge device104A may be a 5G-enabled repeater device that increases the coverage ofa 5G-enabled RAN node, such as a gNB or a 5G-enabled small cell, andallows the first UE 106A to attach to the 5G-enabled RAN node throughitself (i.e., through the edge device 104A), where the first antennaarray 210A is controlled to direct the first beam of RF signal having asignal strength greater than the first threshold (i.e. a SNR or signalquality sufficient to establish communication in multigigabitthroughput). In an example, a signal strength sufficient to decode aprimary synchronization signal (PSS) at the first UE 106A may beconsidered as a sufficiently good signal quality to establishcommunication between a source node (e.g., gNB or a 5G-enabled smallcell) and a destination node, i.e., the first UE 106A, via the edgedevice 104A. The first UE 106A may be at a distance or a location whichmay be not suited for RF communication directly by the source node(e.g., the gNB or the small cell), for example, may suffer from signalattenuation. The sensing and beamforming may be cooperatively executedin real-time or near real-time for faster and accurate decisions toalter the beams of RF signals as per need without any increase insignaling load on a cellular network, such as the first WCN 110A or thesecond WCN 110B as compared to existing systems.

In an implementation, the control circuitry 214 may be furtherconfigured to track the location of the detected first user 112A in thesurrounding area of the edge device 104A based on the sensor 222 andcontrol the first antenna array 210A to direct a first beam of radiofrequency (RF) signal at the location of the first user 112A beingtracked based on the sensor 222. The beamforming function 220 may be afunction, such as a feature, which, when activated, the first antennaarray 210A directs one or more beams of RF signals to one or more targetobjects in the surrounding area in one or more specific radiationpatterns. In some implementations, the generated 3D environmentrepresentation may be further used as a reference in the beamforming.For example, the generated 3D environment representation may provide areference to correlate the tracked location of the moving object, i.e.,the first user 112A along with the first UE 106A, with a set of thepoint cloud that belongs to the same moving object. This correlationfurther increases the tracking efficiency where the changing location ofthe first user 112A or the first UE 106A can be tracked with improvedaccuracy. Accordingly, the radiation pattern of the first antenna array210A may be calibrated to communicate the first beam of RF signal in aspecific beam shape that is most suited for a defined period, forexample, for next “X” seconds, where “X” is a positive integer, such as5 sec, 10 sec, 15 sec, etc. In an example, if the first user 112A alongwith the first UE 106A is moving away from the edge device 104A, apencil beam or a narrow beam may be employed for communication of thefirst beam of RF signal with the signal strength greater than thethreshold so that both uplink and downlink communication may bemaintained (or increase) at the multigigabit data rate. The radiationpattern may be dynamically updated based on the changes in the locationof the first user 112A co-located with the first UE 106A. For example,if the first user 112A moves nearby (e.g., 10-30 meters) to the edgedevice 104A, then a broad beam may be radiated by the first antennaarray 210A. Such concentration of the beam of RF signal having increasedsignal strength may be executed to enable the first UE 106A to receiveservices of consistent high-performance and ultra-reliablecommunication.

In accordance with an embodiment, the control of the first antenna array210A to direct the first beam of RF signal may comprise selecting afirst radiation pattern (e.g., a narrow or a pencil beam) from aplurality of radiation patterns based on a distance of the first user112A from the edge device 104A. The first radiation pattern may beassociated with a first communication range with respect to the edgedevice 104A. The control of the first antenna array 210A to direct thefirst beam of RF signal comprises executing beamforming in the firstradiation pattern selected from the plurality of radiation patterns tomake the directed first beam of RF signal reach to the first user 112Athat is within the first communication range.

In accordance with an embodiment, the control of the first antenna array210A to direct the first beam of RF signal comprises updating thebeamforming to a second radiation pattern (e.g., a broad beam or aflower shaped beam) from the first radiation pattern to make thedirected first beam of RF signal reach to the first user 112A. Thesecond radiation pattern is associated with a second communication range(e.g., 10-30 meters around the edge device 104A in an example, i.e.,nearby the edge device 104A) with respect to the edge device 104A. Thebeamforming may be updated to the second radiation pattern having thesignal strength greater than a second threshold when the first user 112Amoves to the second communication range from the first communicationrange. For example, a lower number of antenna elements of the firstantenna array 210A may be activated in case the first user 112A iswithin the second communication range (e.g., 10-30 meters around theedge device 104A in an example, i.e., nearby the edge device 104A) ascompared to the case when the first user 112A moves beyond the firstcommunication range, such as the second communication range (i.e., movesfar away, for example, 31-80 meters or beyond, for example). Thisdynamic change of radiation pattern thus optimizes power consumption atthe edge device 104A meaning more radiation power and a greater numberof antenna elements of the first antenna array 210A may be used whenneeded (e.g., for far-away users) and not by default.

In accordance with an embodiment, the control circuitry 214 may befurther configured to detect and track a second user 112B concurrentlywith the first user 112A in the surrounding area of the edge device 104Abased on the sensor 222. The control circuitry 214 is further configuredto update the control of the first antenna array 210A such that a secondbeam of RF signal having the signal strength greater than the firstthreshold is directed in a second direction towards the second user 112Bconcomitant to the first beam of RF signal that is directed in the firstdirection towards the first user 112A.

In accordance with an embodiment, the control circuitry 214 may befurther configured to update the control of the first antenna array 210Asuch that one beam of RF signal in a defined radiation pattern isdirected to cover the first user 112A as well as the second user 112Bwhen a first location of the first user 112A is within a threshold rangeof a second location of the second user 112B. In this case, if both thefirst user 112A as well as the second user 112B are near to each other(i.e., the first location of the first user 112A is within the thresholdrange of the second location of the second user 112B), a single beam maybe sufficient to illuminate both the users. This intelligent beamformingdecision of which radiation pattern to select based on an inter-distancebetween two users further reduces the power consumption without anycompromise on signal quality for RF communication. For example, insteadof communicating a user-specific pencil beam, a broad beam may becommunicated to cover a group of users. Alternatively, a broad beam maybe communicated most of the time, and narrow or pencil beams may becommunicated only when one or more users move beyond the communicationrange of the broad beam, for example, moves to the first communicationrange from the second communication range.

In accordance with an embodiment, the control circuitry 214 may befurther configured to determine location coordinates of a plurality ofreflective objects in the surrounding area of the edge device 104A.Thereafter, the control circuitry 214 may be further configured toutilize the determined location coordinates of the plurality ofreflective objects to correlate a radiation pattern of the first antennaarray 210A to the plurality of reflective objects. Based on the sensingof the surrounding area of the edge device 104A, the control circuitry214 determines the location coordinates of the plurality of reflectiveobjects that may cause RF signals from the edge device 104A to reflecttowards the edge device 104A. Thus, if the location coordinates areknown, the radiation pattern of the first beam of RF signal may befurther configured to minimize any unwanted signal reflections from theplurality of reflective objects reducing signal noise.

In accordance with an embodiment, the control circuitry 214 may befurther configured to determine a distance and an angle of the edgedevice 104A from each of a plurality of mobile and stationary objectssurrounding the edge device 104A. Based on the sensing, once thedistance and the angle of the edge device 104A from each of theplurality of mobile objects, including the first user 112A andstationary objects surrounding the edge device 104A, are determined, theradiation pattern of the first beam of RF signal may be further improvedin terms of directivity and precision targeting of the highlyconcentrated first beam of RF signal with increased signal strength.

In accordance with an embodiment, the control circuitry 214 may befurther configured to determine local traffic information in real-timeor near real-time based on the sensed surrounding area of the edgedevice 104A. In some implementation, for example, in case of outdoorsdeployment of the edge device 104A, the control circuitry 214 may befurther configured to determine local traffic information in real-timeor near real-time based on the sensed surrounding area of the edgedevice 104A and the generated 3D environment representation of thesurrounding area of the edge device 104A. There may be times whentraffic information from satellites (or maps) is not accurate as suchtraffic information depends on the number of users using such softwareapplications running map services. Based on the sensing, a number ofobjects, such as vehicles, moving in the surrounding area of the edgedevice 104A may be counted, which in turn indicates traffic informationaccurately locally around the edge device 104A independent of the use ofthe Internet-based map services. Furthermore, the correlation of suchlocal traffic information with the generated 3D environmentrepresentation further improves the accuracy of the determination of thelocal traffic information in real-time or near real-time. Such localtraffic information determined in real-time or near real-time may bethen used to further improve radiation patterns to communicate one ormultiple beams of RF signals concurrently for different UEs, such as thefirst UE 106A and the second UE 106B.

In accordance with an embodiment, the control circuitry 214 may befurther configured to communicate an assistance request to the centralcloud server 102 when one or more defined service continuity criteriaare predicted to be met, to cause the central cloud server 102 toinstruct the edge device 104A or another edge device 104B of theplurality of edge devices 104 with specific initial access informationto continue servicing one or more UEs 106 carried by the first user112A. The one or more defined service continuity criteria may be, forexample, a value of SNR, a value of RSSI or other signal qualityparameter, which may be predicted to deteriorate based on the ongoingchanges in the locations of the surrounding objects tracked by thecontrol circuitry 214. The one or more defined service continuitycriteria, when predicted to be met in an upcoming time, indicates anupcoming possibility of signal blockage for the currently serviced UEsby the edge device 104A, such as the first UE 106A or the second UE106B.

For example, the control circuitry 214 may be further configured topredict a start time and an end time of a signal blockage for the firstUE 106A in motion being serviced by the edge device 104A from a secondmoving object based on a track of the second moving object in thesurrounding area of the edge device 104A. Dynamic nature of surroundingsof the edge device 104A, such as any change in surroundings, have thepotential to adversely impact signal propagation, cause signal loss,poor reach, or signal blockage by an object, such as a moving object ora stationary object, in the surroundings. For example, in certainscenarios, there may be temporary signal blockage due to the secondmoving object that may block signals between the edge device 104A and abase station, such as the first base station 108A or there may be ablockage due to a non-line-of-sight (NLOS) between the first basestation 108A and the edge device 104A. In some other scenarios, theremay be signal blockage due to the second moving object that may blocksignals between the edge device 104A and the first UE 106A. Based on thesensing, for example, based on a determination of distance, angle,velocity, and moving direction of the first user 112A carrying the firstUE 106A and the second moving object, with respect to the edge device104A, the control circuitry 214 may predict the start time and the endtime of the signal blockage for the first UE 106A in motion much beforethe signal blockage occurs. Thereafter, the control circuitry 214 may befurther configured to communicate an alert of the predicted signalblockage for the first UE 106A to the central cloud server 102 alongwith the predicted start time and the end time of the signal blockage tocause the central cloud server 102 to instruct another edge device ofthe plurality of edge devices 104 with specific initial accessinformation to continue servicing the first UE 106A. Alternatively,instead of the central cloud server 102, the control circuitry 214 maybe further configured to communicate an alert of the predicted signalblockage for the first UE 106A to another edge device of the pluralityof edge devices 104 along with at least the predicted start time of thesignal blockage and a specific initial access information to cause theother edge device to continue servicing the first UE 106A. Accordingly,the central cloud server 102 may be configured to select an appropriateedge device, such as the edge device 104B, to communicate wirelessconnectivity enhanced information, including specific initial accessinformation to the other edge device to bypass the initial access-searchon the other edge device. Based on the specific initial accessinformation, the other edge device may quickly switch over to theappropriate base station (e.g., using PCID of the base station andARFCN) received from the central cloud server 102 to continue servicingthe first UE 106A. The specific initial access information may furtherindicate to select a particular service side beam index, e.g., a beamindex #41 out of 0-63 beam indexes in a beam book (stored in the memory216) and a particular radiation pattern to service the first UE 106Abypassing the initial access search at the other edge device, such asthe edge device 104B, where the handover time is much lesser than thestandard average mm-wave gNB handover time under same scenarios, such assame cell radius and travelling speed of the first UE 106A.

In accordance with an embodiment, the control circuitry 214 may befurther configured to set an offline mode or a connected mode at theedge device 104A. In the connected mode, the control circuitry 214 maybe further configured to periodically communicate sensing information tothe central cloud server 102 based on the sensed surrounding area of theedge device 104A. The sensing information may comprise two or more of: adistance and an angle of the edge device 104A from each of a pluralityof objects surrounding the edge device 104A, a position (e.g., 3Dcoordinates) of the edge device 104A, a location and a moving directionof a plurality of UEs including the first UE 106A, a time-of-day, localtraffic information, local road information, local constructioninformation, a local traffic light information, and local weatherinformation.

In accordance with an embodiment, the control circuitry 214 may befurther configured to obtain wireless connectivity enhanced informationfrom the central cloud server 102 based on a position of the edge device104A in the connected mode. The wireless connectivity enhancedinformation may include specific initial access information to bypass aninitial access-search on the edge device 104A. The wireless connectivityenhanced information provided by the central cloud server 102 for thefirst UE 106A and the second UE 106B may include selected initial accessinformation to further accelerate UE-specific beamforming for each ofthe first UE 106A and the second UE 106B and connectivity to one or morebase stations, such as the first base station 108A and the second basestation 108B, from the edge device 104A bypassing an initialaccess-search on the edge device 104A. The wireless connectivityenhanced information, including the specific initial access informationfor the edge device 104A, is extracted from the connectivity enhanceddatabase 102A. The selected initial access information for the first UE106A and the second UE 106B may indicate the best and/or optimaltransmit (Tx) and receive (Rx) beam for the donor side 202A and the bestTx-Rx beam for the service side 202B, best Physical Cell Identities(PCIDs) associated with different service providers, best and/or optimalabsolute radio-frequency channel number (ARFCNs), and a signal strengthinformation associated with each of Tx beam and the Rx beam of the edgedevice 104A. The terms best and/or optimal refers to wirelessconnectivity using multiple beams of RF signals at both the donor side202A and service side 202B that has the highest signal strength (oramong the top three available signal strengths), for example, for 5G NRsignals and data throughput rate higher than one or more specifiedthreshold values, while executing uplink and downlink communicationusing one or more of the plurality of different WCNs 110. The specificinitial access information may indicate which beam index to set at anedge device, such as the edge device 104A, for the uplink communication,a specific Physical Cell Identity (PCID) which indicates which gNB toconnect to, or which WCN of the plurality of different WCNs 110 toselect, which is the best absolute radio-frequency channel number(ARFCN), which specific beam configuration to set, or whether aconnection to the base station is to be established directly orindirectly in an NLOS path using another edge device, such as the edgedevice 104B, in a network of edge devices depending on the currentlocation of the edge device 104A. The specific initial accessinformation may further indicate which beam index to set at an edgedevice, such as the edge device 104A for the downlink communication,which WCN to select, which specific beam configuration to set, whatpower level of the RF signal may be sufficient, or an expected timeperiod to service one or more UEs, such as the first UE 106A, dependingon the deployed location of the edge device 104A.

The control circuitry 214 may be further configured to receive aresponse from the central cloud server 102 that no handover is requiredfor the edge device 104A for one or more of the plurality of UEs basedon the communicated sensing information. In a case where a wirelessconnection (e.g., a cellular connectivity) of a UE that is in motion,such as the first UE 106A, is about to become less than a thresholdperformance value, such performance drop may be predicted by the centralcloud server 102 based on new sensing information received from one ormore edge devices in the vicinity of the UE or from the first UE 106Aitself. For example, the first UE 106A may be attached to the first basestation 108A, and as the first UE 106A moves, the distance from thefirst base station 108A may increase, and the signal strength maygradually decrease. Thus, based on the new sensing information, such asa moving direction of the first UE 106A, a location of the first UE106A, distance from one or more edge devices in the vicinity of thefirst UE 106A, a current weather condition, the location of thereflective objects around the first UE 106A, and an overall 3Denvironment representation around the first UE 106A, the central cloudserver 102 determines that a handover is required to maintain QoE, andaccordingly selects a suitable edge device (e.g., the edge device 104Aor the edge device 104B) among the plurality of edge devices 104 andcommunicates wireless connectivity enhanced information to such selectededge device so that there is no need to perform beam sweeping operationor standard initial access search on such edge device. Thus, the firstUE 106A may readily connect to the edge device 104A or another edgedevice, such as the edge device 104B, and continue to perform uplink anddownlink communication with high throughput without any interruptions.Similarly, in accordance with an embodiment, the central cloud server102 may be further configured to determine that no handover is requiredfor the edge device 104A or the other edge device, such as the edgedevice 104B, when a performance state of a wireless connection of theUE, such as the first UE 106A, is greater than a threshold performancevalue.

Beneficially, multiple UEs, such as the first UE 106A and the second UE106B, associated with different service providers may be serviced by asingle edge device, such as the edge device 104A (e.g., an indoordeployed repeater device or a repeater device deployed as an RSU).Alternatively stated, a single edge device can service multiple UEsassociated with different service providers, thereby reducing (i.e.,optimizing) the total number of network nodes for each service providerrequired to be deployed or used to service the same number of UEs in oneor more geographical areas. Furthermore, the edge device 104A ensuresseamless connectivity as well as QoE while reducing the infrastructurecost by greater than 50 percent considering just two different serviceproviders, such as the first WCN 110A and the second WCN 110B. The edgedevice 104A seamlessly handles heterogeneity and supports the pluralityof different WCNs 110 for high performance and reliable communication.Furthermore, a consumer, such as the first UE 106A, is provided tochoose which WCN (i.e., which service provider) they like to connect to,and this is enabled from the cloud, such as the central cloud server102. The central cloud server 102 transmits specific initial accessinformation (optimal initial access information) associated with one ormore WCNs, such as the first WCN 110A and the second WCN 110B, to theedge device 104A, where such specific initial access information is usedby the edge device 104A to establish wireless connectivity bypassingconventional initial-access search. Hence, beneficially, a consumer of aUE, such as the first UE 106A, subscribed to the first WCN 110A canrequest the edge device 104A in the connection request to relay an RFsignal of the first WCN 110A, and if the consumer of the first UE 106Ais subscribed to the second WCN 110B, then the first UE 106A can requestthe edge device 104A, to relay an RF signal of the second WCN 110B.Additionally, and advantageously, as the obtained connectivity enhancedinformation for the first UE 106A and the second UE 106B is independentof the plurality of different WCNs 110, the complexity and the initialaccess latency is significantly reduced as the standard beam sweepingoperation in the initial access phase is bypassed and is not required tobe performed at the first UE 106A and the second UE 106B and the edgedevice 104A, which in turn improves network performance and reducesadditional signaling load (due to standard initial-access search) onassociated WCNs of the plurality of different WCNs 110.

In accordance with an embodiment, the control circuitry 214 is furtherconfigured to utilize the obtained connectivity enhanced information to,for example: reduce time to align to a timing offset of a beam receptionat the edge device 104A to a frame structure of a 5G NR radio frame, andallow uplink and downlink to use complete 5G NR frequency spectrum fordifferent service providers; set beam index or set phase values of thereceived RF signals to design beams to service the first UE 106A and thesecond UE 106B in real time or near real time based on the trackedlocations of the corresponding users carrying the first UE 106A and thesecond UE 106B; set parameters, e.g., amplifier gains, and phaseresponses associated with the one or more donor antenna arrays 206 orthe one or more service antenna arrays 210; form specific beam patternsfrom the edge device 104A specific to cover the first UE 106A and thesecond UE 106B based on tracking of the locations of the first user 112Aand the second user 112B; execute dynamic partitioning of a plurality ofantenna elements of the first antenna array 210A of the one or moreservice antenna arrays 210 at the service side 202B into a plurality ofspatially separated antenna sub-arrays to generate multiple beams indifferent directions at the same time or in a different time slot; set asuitable adjustment of a power back-off to minimize (i.e., substantiallyreduce) the impact of interference (echo or noise signals) and henceonly use as much power as needed to achieve low error communication withthe first base station 108A or the second base station 108B in theuplink or the first UE 106A and the second UE 106B in the downlinkcommunication; and optimize blocks of radio and perform Radio accessnetwork optimization to improve coverage, capacity and service qualityof a geographical area surrounding the edge device 104A.

In accordance with an embodiment, the control circuitry 214 may befurther configured to recognize the first UE 106A in motion to be avalid device to receive one or more services from the edge device 104A.The edge device 104A may be in an offline mode or a connected mode. Theconnected mode refers to a setting in which the edge device 104A may becommunicatively coupled to the central cloud server 102. The offlinemode refers to a setting or mode where the edge device 104A may not becommunicatively coupled to the central cloud server 102. In both theoffline mode and the connected mode, the control circuitry 214 canrecognize the first UE 106A in motion to be the valid device.

In an implementation, when the first UE 106A is in the communicationrange of the edge device 104A, an authentication key may beautomatically communicated by the first UE 106A to the edge device 104A.The authentication key may be validated locally by the edge device 104Ain the offline mode or via the central cloud server 102 in the connectedmode, and if the validation is successful, the first UE 106A may berecognized as the valid device. In another implementation, the first UE106A may have an application that controls the validation between thefirst UE 106A and the edge device 104A, for example, based on aregistered gesture or defined validation data, such as a hash value. Inan example, the first UE 106A may be a smartphone that may have theapplication installed in it, where the application may becommunicatively coupled to the central cloud server 102. In anotherexample, the first UE 106A may be a vehicle, in which the applicationmay be installed in a smartphone connected to an in-vehicle infotainmentsystem of the vehicle, or the application may be preinstalled in thevehicle (e.g., in the in-vehicle infotainment system). A uniqueidentity, for example, in the form of the authentication key, or theregistered gesture, or other identifying means may be used to identifyusers associated with the first UE 106A as a valid user to receiveservices of the central cloud server 102 and the edge device 104A in animplementation. In yet another implementation, the control circuitry 214may be configured to receive a connection request from the first UE 106Aassociated with the first WCN 110A of a first service provider. Theconnection request may be received via an out-of-band communication,such as Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Li-Fi, a sidelink request (e.g., LTE sidelink,5G New Radio (NR) sidelink, NR C-V2X sidelink), avehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I) request, a personal area network (PAN)connection, or other out-of-band connection requests. The controlcircuitry 214 may be further configured to validate the first UE 106Abased on the connection request.

In accordance with an embodiment, the control circuitry 214 may befurther configured to obtain a corresponding activation signal from eachof the first UE 106A and the second UE 106B. The correspondingactivation signal may be generated at the first UE 106A and the secondUE 106B using at least one of an application installed in the first UE106A and the second UE 106B, an authentication key, or a registeredgesture. The control circuitry 214 may be further configured to activatethe edge device 104A to service the first UE 164A and the second UE 106Bbased on an authentication of the corresponding activation signal.

In some implementations, in the connected mode, the validation of thefirst UE 106A as the valid device by the edge device 104A may becontrolled by the central cloud server 102 based on communication ofsensing information, for example, a current position, a movingdirection, a time-of-day, a device ID associated with the first UE 106A.The central cloud server 102 may identify that the device ID is knownand communicate such information to the edge device 104A in advancebefore the first UE 106A reaches the communication range of the edgedevice 104A as the central cloud server 102 has information of thetravel path of the first UE 106A based on the sensing informationreceived from the first UE 106A. Thus, the control circuitry 214 canrecognize the first UE 106A in motion to be the valid device directly orindirectly with the assistance of the central cloud server 102.

In an implementation, the control circuitry 214 may be furtherconfigured to execute beamforming to direct the first beam of RF signalhaving the signal strength greater than the threshold to the first user112A carrying the first UE 106A in motion only when the first UE 106A orthe first user 112A is recognized as the valid device, based on thetrack of the location of the first user 112A. The radiation pattern maybe dynamically updated based on the changes in the location of the firstuser 112A. Such concentration of the beam of RF signal having increasedsignal strength may be executed for devices that are recognized by theedge device 104A as a valid device to receive such service of consistenthigh-performance and ultra-reliable communication. Such validation maybe put off when the edge device 104A may be deployed indoors for anenterprise, and all the users within the enterprise may be considered asvalid users or valid devices. However, such validation may be switchedON when the edge device 104A may be deployed outdoors. However, toopt-in or opt-out of such validation is at user discretion and may beremotely controlled automatically or may be manually set.

In an implementation, instead of the sensor 222, a first portion of thefirst antenna array 210A may be used for the sensing, and one or moresecond portions of the first antenna array are used for the beamformingto direct the first beam of RF signal in a defined radiation pattern. Insuch an implementation, a portion of the same phase array antenna, suchas the first antenna array 210A, may be used for the sensing, such astracking the position of the first UE 106A, whereas other portions ofthe same phase array antenna may be used for communication of the firstbeam of RF signal having the signal strength greater than the thresholdto the first UE 106A in motion. In such an implementation, the use of aportion of the first antenna array 210A for sensing not only ensures acompact design of antenna and the edge device 104A but may also reduce(i.e., optimize) the power usage of the edge device 104A.

In an implementation, the control circuitry 214 may be furtherconfigured to determine that the detected first user 112A carries anXG-enabled UE (e.g., the first UE 106A) and distinguish the first user112A who carries the XG-enabled UE from other users devoid of anycorresponding XG-enabled UEs. The first beam of RF signal may bedirected at an XG-carrier frequency at the location of the first user112A while avoiding directing any beams of RF signals at the XG-carrierfrequency to the other users devoid of any corresponding XG-enabled UEs,where XG refers to 5G, beyond 5G, or 6G radio communication. The edgedevice 104A may include a UE power detector feature, by which theservice side 202B of the edge device 104A (e.g., a relay or a repeaterdevice) can identify the location of the XG-enabled UE (e.g., the firstUE 106A) to form a closed loop control system, i.e., the sensor 222(e.g., a FMCW radar in this case) may locate the movement of a person,but how to distinguish that it is a 5G UE and not just a person walkingnearby (e.g., moving in front of, across, or behind) the service side202B of the edge device 104A. Beneficially, the control circuitry 214 isable to execute a check whether the detected first user 112A carries theXG-enabled UE or not even without the need to install any softwareapplication on the XG-enabled UE (e.g., a 5G-enabled smartphone like thefirst UE 106A). The control circuitry 214 is able to filter anddistinguish people without XG-enabled UEs from people with XG-enabledUEs. This is very useful for known reasons that most people resistinstalling apps in their smartphones. Advantageously, the edge device104A do not require the XG-enabled UEs to use any pre-installedapplication or do not need introducing any application on any XG-enabledUEs (e.g., a 5G-enabled smartphone), but still is able to differentiatebetween people not carrying XG-enabled UEs (i.e., 5G-enabledsmartphones) from people carrying XG-enabled UEs. The one or moreservice antenna arrays 210 of the edge device 104A is configured to firea plurality of test beams of RF signals as the user moves by electronicbeam steering using different beam indexes of a beam book, which may bea modified beam book, to confirm that the detected first user 112Acarries the XG-enabled UE. A pre-loaded beam book used typically incommunication devices like repeaters is modified, referred to as themodified beam book. An example of the modified beam book is shown anddescribed, for example, in FIG. 3C. A communication device, such as arepeater, is typically blind to the presence of people, and mainlydetects location of people or users using known beam sweeping and uplinkand downlink beam measurements. Beneficially, in the present disclosure,in order to determine the detected first user 112A carries theXG-enabled UE (e.g., the first UE 106A) and distinguish the first user112A who carries the XG-enabled UE from other users devoid of anycorresponding XG-enabled UEs with increased accuracy and certainty(almost 100% accuracy), the edge device 104A correlates the radar datafrom the sensor 222 (e.g., a Radar) with a beam power level data of agiven beam index. If the radar data from the sensor 222 indicates thatthe first user 112A is in a certain direction and location in thesurrounding area of the edge device 104A and further a given beam of agiven beam index (say beam #51) fired in that same direction from theone or more service antenna arrays 210 at the service side 202B of theedge device 104A also indicates a highest signal power levelcommunicated to and from the XG-enabled UE at almost same location, thenit can be established that the first user 112A carries the XG-enabledUE. An example of the modified beam book and details of operations todetermine if a given user carries the XG-enabled UE or not is furtherexplained, for example, in FIG. 3C.

In another aspect, the edge device 104A may comprise the first antennaarray 210A, the sensor 222 configured to sense a surrounding area of theedge device 104A, and the control circuitry 214, where the controlcircuitry 214 may be configured to detect the first user 112A in thesurrounding area of the edge device 104A sensed by the sensor 222. Thecontrol circuitry 214 may be further configured to track the location ofthe detected first user 112A in the surrounding area of the edge device104A based on the sensor 222. The control circuitry 214 may be furtherconfigured to control the first antenna array 210A to direct a firstbeam of RF signal at the location of the first user 112A being trackedbased on the sensor 222.

In accordance with an embodiment, the control of the first antenna array210A to direct the first beam of RF signal may comprise selecting afirst radiation pattern from a plurality of radiation patterns based ona distance of the first user 112A from the edge device 104A, where thefirst radiation pattern is associated with the first communication rangewith respect to the edge device 104A. The control of the first antennaarray 210A to direct the first beam of RF signal may further compriseexecuting beamforming in the first radiation pattern selected from theplurality of radiation patterns to make the first beam of RF signal tobe directed in a first direction of the first user 112A to reach thefirst user 112A present in the first communication range. The control ofthe first antenna array 210A to direct the first beam of RF signal mayfurther comprise updating beamforming to a second radiation pattern fromthe first radiation pattern to make the directed first beam of RF signalreach the first user 112A, where the second radiation pattern isassociated with a second communication range with respect to the edgedevice 104A, and where the beamforming is updated to the secondradiation pattern when the first user 112A moves to the secondcommunication range from the first communication range.

In accordance with an embodiment, the control circuitry 214 may befurther configured to detect and track a location of the second user112B concurrently with the first user 112A in the surrounding area ofthe edge device 104A based on the sensor 222. The control circuitry 214may be further configured to update the control of the first antennaarray 210A such that the second beam of RF signal is directed in asecond direction towards the second user to reach the second user 112Bconcomitant to the first beam of RF signal that is directed in a firstdirection towards the first user 112A to reach the first user 112A.

FIG. 2B is a diagram illustrating an antenna array of an edge device, inaccordance with an embodiment of the disclosure. FIG. 2B is explained inconjunction with elements from FIGS. 1 and 2A. With reference to FIG.2B, there is shown the first antenna array 210A of the edge device 104Athat may be a multi-function edge device, where a first portion 228 ofthe first antenna array 210A is used for the sensing to sense asurrounding area of the edge device 104A and tracking of objects and asecond portion 230 of the first antenna array 210A used for thecalibration for forming the first beam of RF signal in the calibratedradiation pattern. The first portion 228 may include a first set ofantenna elements that radiate an RF wave in a first frequency (e.g., anout-of-band mmWave frequency) for the sensing of the surrounding areaand for tracking the one or more users carrying the one or more UEs 106in a first communication range. The second portion 230 may include asecond set of antenna elements that radiate beamformed RF wave, i.e.,the beam of RF signals in a second frequency (e.g., an in-band mmWavefrequency that is owned or operated by one of the plurality of differentWCNs 110) for an uplink and a downlink cellular communication with thetracked one or more UEs 106 in a second communication range. In thisimplementation, the count of antenna elements in the second set ofantenna elements may be greater than the first set of antenna elements.Furthermore, the first communication range may be greater than thesecond communication range so that sensing and tracking of the locationof the one or more users carrying the one or more UEs 106, such as thefirst UE 106A, may be successfully executed much ahead of time beforethe one or more UEs 106, such as the first UE 106A, enters the secondcommunication range of the edge device 104A. For example, the controlcircuitry 214 by use of the first portion 228 is configured to determinea velocity, a moving direction, a distance, an angle, a local travelpath (e.g., a trajectory of motion) of the first UE 106A based on thetrack of the first user 112A before the first user 112A associated withthe first UE 106A enters the second communication range of the edgedevice 104A. This provides the control circuitry 214 some leverage toperform the activation of the beamforming function 220 and performpreprocessing for the beamforming of the best suitable radiation patternbased on the tracking in advance so that as soon as the one or moreusers along with the one or more UEs 106, such as the first UE 106A,enters the second communication range, the first beam of RF signalhaving a signal strength greater than a threshold can be concentrated onthe first user 112A carrying the first UE 106A in motion that is alreadybeing tracked precisely. The first beam of RF signal may relay a datastream to/from a source, such as the first base station 108A, to/fromthe first UE 106A.

In some implementations, the first portion 228 may be a predefinedportion (in the first antenna array 210A) that is configured forsensing. Similarly, the second portion 230 of the first antenna array210A may be another predefined portion (in the first antenna array 210A)that is configured for the beamforming.

In some implementations, the control circuitry 214 may be configured toexecute dynamic partitioning of a plurality of antenna elements of thefirst antenna array 210A into a plurality of spatially separated antennasub-arrays, where one spatially separated antenna sub-array may be usedas a sensing radar for the sensing purpose whereas other spatiallyseparated antenna sub-arrays may be used for the beamforming to eitherform one radiation pattern to communicate the first beam of RF signalcalibration of multiple radiation patterns to generate multiple beams indifferent directions at the same time or in a different time slot. Anexample of dynamic partitioning of the plurality of antenna elements ofthe first antenna array 210A is described in FIG. 2C.

FIG. 2C is a diagram illustrating an antenna array of an edge device, inaccordance with another embodiment of the disclosure. FIG. 2C isexplained in conjunction with elements from FIGS. 1 and 2A. Withreference to FIG. 2B, there is shown the first antenna array 210A of theedge device 104A that may be a multi-function edge device. In thisimplementation, the control circuitry 214 may be configured to executedynamic partitioning of a plurality of antenna elements of the firstantenna array 210A into a plurality of spatially separated antennasub-arrays. In this case, two portions of the first antenna array 210A,such as portions 232A and 232B, may be configured to communicate twodifferent beams of RF signals for two UEs, such as the first UE 106A andthe second UE 106B concomitantly. The two different beams of RF signalsmay be communicated in different directions and angles and may havedifferent radiation patterns, such as one may be a narrow beam while theother may be a comparatively wider beam. Similarly, two portions of thefirst antenna array 210A, such as portions 234A and 234B, may beconfigured to communicate two RF waves for sensing purposes to sense andtrack objects in different areas (e.g., UEs coming towards edge device104A may be considered as one area, whereas UEs moving away from theedge device 104A may be considered as another area) of the surroundingarea of the edge device 104A and track multiple UEs in motion at thesame time.

FIG. 3A is a diagram illustrating a first exemplary scenario forimplementation of the edge device for high-performance communication, inaccordance with an embodiment of the disclosure. FIG. 3A is explained inconjunction with elements from FIGS. 1 and 2A, 2B, and 2C. Withreference to FIG. 3A, there is shown an exemplary scenario 300A. Theexemplary scenario 300A includes a 5G-enabled repeater device,hereinafter simply referred to as a repeater device 302, and a userequipment (UE) 304A, which may be a vehicle in the exemplary scenario300A. The repeater device 302 comprises the control circuitry 214, afirst antenna array 306 at a service side 302A of the repeater device302, and a second antenna array 308 at a donor side 302B of the repeaterdevice 302.

In accordance with the exemplary scenario 300A, the repeater device 302corresponds to the edge device 104A, and the UE 304A corresponds to thefirst UE 106A (FIGS. 1 and 2 ). The UE 304A may be a vehicle moving awayfrom the repeater device 302 that may be deployed at a fixed location,such as roadside. The control circuitry 214 may be configured toactivate the sensing function 218 to sense a surrounding area of therepeater device 302. In an implementation, the control circuitry 214 maybe configured to activate the sensing function 218 automatically when amoving object, such as the UE 304A, is detected within a communicationrange. In another implementation, the control circuitry 214 may beconfigured to activate the sensing function 218 based on an activationsignal received from the UE 304A. Due to inadequate data throughput andsignal strength of a cellular connectivity directly from a base station,such as the first base station 108A, the activation signal may becommunicated by the UE 304A to the repeater device 302, for example, viaan out-of-band channel, such as a Wi-Fi or other personal area networkcommunication channel. The UE 304A may have a preinstalled application.Based on a defined setting, the preinstalled application may cause theUE 304A to send the activation signal automatically to the repeaterdevice 302 when the UE 304A moves within a communication range of therepeater device 302. Alternatively, based on user input to anapplication interface of the preinstalled application, the UE 304A maysend the activation signal to the repeater device 302. In yet anotherimplementation, the central cloud server 102 may be communicativelycoupled to the preinstalled application of the UE 304A and may detectthe location of the UE 304A, and thereafter may direct the applicationto cause to the UE 304A to communicate the activation signal to therepeater device 302.

The repeater device 302 may be a multi-function edge device in which afirst portion 306A of the first antenna array 306 is used for thesensing. In another implementation, a separate sensor, such as thesensor 222, may be used for sensing and tracking purposes. In animplementation, the control circuitry 214 may be further configured torecognize the UE 304A in motion to be a valid device to receive one ormore services from the repeater device 302 by use of the first portion306A of the first antenna array 306. In another implementation, suchvalidation may not be performed. The control circuitry 214 may befurther configured to track a location of the UE 304A or a user carryingthe UE 304A with a centimeter-level accuracy (i.e., less than 5 or 10 cmof positioning error) in motion from the repeater device 302 by use ofthe first portion 306A of the first antenna array 306 or the sensor 222.For example, an RF wave 310 may be communicated to sense and track thelocation of the UE 304A or the user carrying the UE 304A. The controlcircuitry 214 may be further configured to execute beamforming to directthe first beam of RF signal 312 having a signal strength greater than athreshold towards the UE 304A (i.e., a stronger signal is concentratedon the UE 304A) or the user carrying the UE 304A, based on the trackingof the location of the user carrying the UE 304A or tracking of the UE304A.

In an implementation, the first beam of RF signal 312 may becommunicated in a radiation pattern (i.e., a defined shape, such as anarrow or pencil beam) from the same antenna array, i.e., one or moresecond portions of the first antenna array 306, while the sensing isexecuted concomitantly by the first portion 306A of the first antennaarray 306. In another implementation, the first beam of RF signal 312may be communicated in a radiation pattern (i.e., a defined shape, suchas a narrow or pencil beam) from the first antenna array 306, while thesensing and tracking is executed concomitantly by the sensor 222. Thus,the UE 304A may be able to execute uplink and downlink communication viathe repeater device 302 with a comparatively higher data throughput ratebased on the concentrated signal continuously received from the repeaterdevice 302 even though the UE 304A rapidly changes its position andorientation while in motion along a travel path. Furthermore, therepeater device 302 that acts as an edge device is independent of theplurality of different WCNs 110 and thus can provide services to the UE304A either in the first WCN 110A or the second WCN 110B as per choiceor a current subscription of the UE 304A to a particular serviceprovider to ensure seamless connectivity and increase QoE.

In accordance with another exemplary aspect, the repeater device 302 maynot be deployed at a fixed location and maybe instead installed at avehicle and act as an edge device. The UE 304A may also be presentwithin the vehicle. Thus, in this exemplary aspect, the repeater device302 and the UE 304A may be co-located at the vehicle; however, therepeater device 302 may be wirelessly connected to the central cloudserver 102 over an LTE control channel independent of the UE 304A.Alternatively stated, the repeater device 302 is communicatively coupledto the central cloud server 102 irrespective of the connectivity of theUE 304A. Further, in this exemplary aspect, the central cloud server 102may be configured to predict a travel path of the repeater device 302 inmotion (that moves along the vehicle in this case). In other words, thecentral cloud server 102 predicts the travel path that the UE 304A islikely to take based on sensing information received from the repeaterdevice 302. The repeater device 302 may further include a sensor, forexample, a geospatial position sensor (such as a GPS sensor), which maycapture the velocity of its movement. This captured sensing information,for example, the velocity (e.g., indicating speed and moving direction)is used by the central cloud server 102 to determine one or morealternative wireless connectivity options that may be made available tothe UE 304A in motion. In other words, the central cloud server 102 maybe guided by the velocity information, which in turn may trigger thecentral cloud server 102 to elastically alter how many directives (orinstructions for alternative wireless connectivity options) it queues tothe repeater device 302. The central cloud server 102 may be configuredto pre-load impending choices in terms of one or more alternativewireless connectivity options to minimize signaling latency between therepeater device 302 and a base station and/or the central cloud server102 (In this case the UE 304A may be in a vehicle where the repeaterdevice 302 is co-located as an edge device within a vehicle). In otherwords, the central cloud server 102 may be configured to communicate oneor more alternative wireless connectivity options to the repeater device302 (i.e., an edge device), where the one or more alternative wirelessconnectivity options are used by the UE 304A (which may becommunicatively coupled to the repeater device 302) as fallback optionsto maintain consistent wireless connectivity to a base station or therepeater device 302 (i.e., the edge device). Since the control channelmay at times be lost briefly, such pre-loaded one or more alternativewireless connectivity options may be used by the UE 304A as guidancewhen cellular connectivity (e.g., 5G wireless connection) is lost forseveral seconds, such as when the UE 304A and the repeater device 302provided in the vehicle moves in a tunnel or in some remote areas wherecellular coverage is sparse. In an implementation, the prediction of thetravel path of the repeater device 302 (and the UE 304A that isco-located) in motion may be executed based on the machine learningmodel of the central cloud server 102.

In an implementation, the determined one or more alternative wirelessconnectivity options made available to the repeater device 302 as wellas the UE 304A in motion comprises a plurality of different specificinitial access information, where each of the plurality of differentspecific initial access information is capable of assisting the repeaterdevice 302 (e.g., an edge device) to bypass an initial access-search onthe repeater device 302. Each of the plurality of different specificinitial access information is an alternative option for wirelesscellular connectivity communicated to the repeater device 302 based onthe current and upcoming position of the repeater device 302 along thepredicted travel path. In an example, the central cloud server 102 maybe configured to communicate two or more choices, say, four alternativewireless connectivity options, for example, a first, second, third, andfourth choice for wireless connectivity so that the repeater device 302can continue with mmWave connection with the least amount of servicedisruption. Alternatively stated, when the primary choice fails (i.e.,the first communicated wireless connectivity enhanced information thatincludes a first specific initial access information is not usable forsome unforeseen reasons, like loss of signal in a tunnel), otheralternative wireless connectivity options can be selected to maintaincontinuous 5G connectivity for enhanced QoE by the repeater device 302as well as the UE 304A (which may be connected for uplink and downlinkcommunication via the repeater device 302). Thus, having morealternative wireless connectivity options act as a powerful technique tomaintain consistent 5G connectivity irrespective of an internal beamacquisition process of the repeater device 302. Moreover, as suchalternative wireless connectivity options may comprise specific initialaccess information, the standard beam acquisition process is shortened,i.e., the time to scan and acquire new initial access information isshortened, and consequently, failure detection and recovering from itusing the provided multiple alternative wireless connectivity optionscomprises plays a prominent role in increasing the QoE. Furthermore, asthe repeater device 302 also communicates the sensing information,including the moving direction of the UE 304A, a time-of-day, localtraffic information, local road information, local constructioninformation, local traffic light information, the prediction of thetravel path can be made more accurately with more accurate failuredetection and recovering options.

In accordance with yet another exemplary aspect, the repeater device 302may be a ceiling unit deployed indoors at a fixed location. The UE 304Amay be a smartphone carried by a user, such as a first user 112A (ofFIG. 1 ). The repeater device 302 may include the first antenna array306 that may not execute sensing function, for example, in thisexemplary aspect. The repeater device 302 may include the sensor 222that may be configured to sense the surrounding area of the repeaterdevice 302. The control circuitry 214 of the repeater device 302 may beconfigured to detect the user (e.g., the first user 112A) in thesurrounding area of the repeater device 302 sensed by the sensor 222.The control circuitry 214 may be further configured to track thelocation of the detected user (e.g., the first user 112A) in thesurrounding area of the repeater device 302 based on the sensor 222. Thecontrol circuitry 214 may be further configured to control the firstantenna array 306 to direct a first beam of RF signal towards the user(e.g., the first user 112A) and at the location of the user (e.g., firstuser 112A carrying the UE 304A) based on continuous tracking performedby use of the sensor 222. The first beam of RF signal may be made tofollow the user (e.g., the first user 112A carrying the UE 304A), wherethe first beam of RF signal may be shaped dynamically in differentradiation patterns in accordance with changes in the distance of theuser (e.g., first user 112A carrying the UE 304A) from the repeaterdevice 302 as the user moves near or away from the repeater device 302to maintain consistent QoE and high throughput, for example,multi-gigabit data rate.

FIG. 3B is a diagram illustrating a second exemplary scenario forimplementation of the edge device and method for sensor-assistedbeamforming for high performance and reliable communication, inaccordance with an embodiment of the disclosure. FIG. 3B is explained inconjunction with elements from FIGS. 1, 2A, and 3A. With reference toFIG. 3B, there is shown an exemplary scenario 300B. The exemplaryscenario 300B includes a 5G-enabled repeater device, hereinafter simplyreferred to as the repeater device 302N, which is similar to that of therepeater device 302 of FIG. 3A except that the sensor 222 is integratedwith the repeater device 302N. In an example, the repeater device 302Nmay be deployed indoors at a fixed location within an enterprise as apart of a private network. In another example, the repeater device 302Nmay be a ceiling unit deployed indoors to service one or more UEsbeneath the ceiling in an enclosed area (e.g., a room or office space).In yet another example, the repeater device 302N may be deployedoutdoors, for example, at a corner of a building or a street-crosssection, for example, to overcome the signal obstruction. There isfurther shown a UE 304B, which may be a smartphone carried by the firstuser 112A. The repeater device 302N may further include the controlcircuitry 214, the first antenna array 306 at the service side 302A ofthe repeater device 302N, and a second antenna array 308 at the donorside 302B of the repeater device 302N.

In accordance with the exemplary scenario 300B, the repeater device 302corresponds to the edge device 104A, and the UE 304B corresponds to thefirst UE 106A (FIG. 1 ). In operation, the sensor 222 may be configuredto sense a surrounding area of the repeater device 302N. The controlcircuitry 214 of the repeater device 302N may be configured to detectthe first user 112A in the surrounding area of the repeater device 302Nand track the detected first user 112A in the surrounding area of therepeater device 302N based on the sensor 222. For example, an RF wave310 may be communicated to sense and track the location of one or moreobjects, such as the first user 112A carrying the UE 304B. The sensor222 may emit the RF wave 310 in a first frequency, for example, anout-of-band frequency for sensing and tracking purposes. The controlcircuitry 214 may be further configured to control the first antennaarray 306 to direct a first beam of RF signal having a signal strengthgreater than a first threshold in a first direction 316A of the firstuser 112A being tracked based on the sensor 222. The first beam of RFsignal may be communicated in a second frequency (e.g., an in-bandfrequency in 5G band) that may be different from the first frequency.The control of the first antenna array 306 to direct the first beam ofRF signal may comprise selecting a first radiation pattern 314A (e.g., apencil beam or a narrow beam) from a plurality of radiation patternsbased on a distance of the first user 112A from the repeater device302N, where the first radiation pattern 314A is associated with a firstcommunication range 320A with respect to the repeater device 302N. Thecontrol of the first antenna array 306 to direct the first beam of RFsignal may further comprise executing beamforming in the first radiationpattern 314A selected from the plurality of radiation patterns to makethe directed first beam of RF signal reach the first user 112A trackedat a first location 318A that is within the first communication range320A (e.g., farthest away from the repeater device 302N).

The first user 112A may move near the repeater device 302N, for example,to a second location 318B from the first location 318A. Based on thecontinuous tracking of the first user 112A, the first beam of RF signalmay be made to follow the first user 112A to enable the UE 304B carriedby the first user 112A to perform uplink and downlink communication witha RAN node, such as a gNB or a small cell, via the repeater device 302Nwithout interruptions. The control circuitry 214 may be furtherconfigured to periodically update the radiation pattern of the firstbeam of RF signal in accordance with the changes in the location of thefirst user 112A carrying the UE 304B. For instance, the radiationpattern may become less narrow from the first radiation pattern 314A asthe first user 112A approaches towards the repeater device 302N. Thecontrol circuitry 214 may be further configured to update thebeamforming to a second radiation pattern 314B (e.g., a broad beam or aflower beam) to make the directed first beam of RF signal reach thefirst user 112A, where the second radiation pattern 314B is associatedwith a second communication range 320B with respect to the repeaterdevice 302N. The second communication range 320B may be less than thefirst communication range 320A. The beamforming may be updated to thesecond radiation pattern 314B having the signal strength greater than asecond threshold when the first user 112A moves to the secondcommunication range 320B from the first communication range 320A tomaintain connectivity with the RAN node, such as the gNB or the smallcell with consistently high throughput and adequate signal strengthusing the repeater device 302N. The repeater device 302N thus executessensing, tracking, and beamforming cooperatively in real-time or nearreal-time that enables making faster and accurate decisions to alter thebeams as per need without any increase in signaling load on a cellularnetwork and further ensures the best performance consistently in termsof high throughput data rate as well as ultra-reliable communication ascompared to existing systems. Further, the repeater device 302N and themethod of the present disclosure ensure seamless connectivity as well asQoE while reducing the infrastructure cost due to effective managementand concentration of radiation pattern of the beams of RF signals havinghigher signal strength due to precise sensing, tracking, and beamformingfunctions that work in cooperation.

FIG. 3C is a diagram illustrating a third exemplary scenario forimplementation of the edge device and method for sensor-assistedbeamforming for high performance and reliable communication, inaccordance with an embodiment of the disclosure. FIG. 3C is explained inconjunction with elements from FIGS. 1, 2A, and 3B. With reference toFIG. 3C, there is shown an exemplary scenario 300C. The exemplaryscenario 300C depicts a modified beam book. A typical pre-loaded beambook used typically in communication devices like repeaters may bemodified, referred to as the modified beam book. A typical pre-loadedbeam book generally includes a plurality of beam indexes arranged in avertical direction, like a list of beam indexes. In this exemplaryscenario 300C, in the modified beam book, the plurality of beam indexesmay be arranged in horizontal direction (horizontal with respect tosurface of ground plane) depicted by a gum-stick representation (small,rounded circles), as shown. Such beam indexes (i.e., gum-sticks) aremapped horizontally in the edge device 104A, for example, at the one ormore service antenna arrays 210 at the service side 202B. The one ormore service antenna arrays 210 at the service side 202B of the edgedevice 104A may be configured to fire a plurality of test beams of RFsignals by electronic beam steering using different beam indexes of themodified beam book, to confirm that the detected first user 112A carriesthe XG-enabled UE. A communication device, such as the repeater, istypically blind to the presence of people, and mainly detects locationof UEs using known beam sweeping and uplink and downlink beammeasurements, which is time consuming and not very effective. In orderto determine the detected first user 112A carries the XG-enabled UE(e.g., the first UE 106A) and distinguish the first user 112A whocarries the XG-enabled UE from other users devoid of any correspondingXG-enabled UEs with increased accuracy and certainty (almost 100%accuracy), the edge device 104A correlates the radar data from thesensor 222 (e.g., a Radar) with a beam power level data of a given beamindex. If both the radar data from the sensor 222 indicates that thefirst user 112A is in a certain direction and location in thesurrounding area of the edge device 104A and that a given beam of agiven beam index (say beam #51) fired in that same direction from theone or more service antenna arrays 210 also indicates a highest signalpower level communicated to and from the XG-enabled UE at almost samelocation, then it can be established that the first user 112A carriesthe XG-enabled UE.

Typically, there is an uplink and downlink beam power level polling (orsampling) mechanism, where different beams may be fired using differentbeam indexes, say beam indexes, 40, 43, 11, 45, 47, 49, 51, 40, 20, 54,56, 36, 38, etc, of the modified beam book, and their power levels(e.g., Reference Signal Received Power (RSRP)) may be measured. There isa finite number of beam indexes (or beams) in a typicaltelecommunication device, such as a repeater device. When the differentbeams are fired using different beam indexes, an application processor,such as the control circuitry 214, can poll (sample) power levels acrossdifferent beams, and detect that more energy is coming from oneparticular beam, say beam with beam index #51 as compared to other beamshaving other beam indexes. Moreover, based on the sensor 222 (e.g., aRadar), it is also ascertained that there is a user there in thedirection of the beam with beam index #51. This is further correlatedwith the radar data of the sensor 222 when the user moves, and adifferent beam with beam index #49, may start to indicate more powerlevel as compared to other beams fired from the service side 202B. Thus,it may be determined with high accuracy if the user carries anXG-enabled UE or not. In other words, electronic steering fires beamscircled as the user moves. During experimentation, it was observed thatthis required no training cycles and the edge device 104A by use of thismechanism was able to adapt to a new deployment location within minutes,where such adaptation is a one-time activity for a given deployedlocation. It was observed that there was an improvement (i.e., anincrease) of about 8 dBm RSRP and 10-40% reduction in power consumptionin the edge device 104A when the sensor 222 was used as compared to whensensor 222 was not used, for example, to classify and distinguish peoplecarrying the XG-enabled UEs from other users devoid of any correspondingXG-enabled UEs, and use that information to select and direct a suitablebeam (in this case, the beam with beam index #51 and then beam index#49) towards the tracked location and direction of that user. The edgedevice 104A is able to filter and distinguish people without XG-enabledUEs from people with XG-enabled UEs. This is very useful for knownreasons that most people resist installing apps in their smartphones.Advantageously, the edge device 104A do not require the XG-enabled UEsto use any pre-installed application or do not need introducing anyapplication on any XG-enabled UEs (e.g., a 5G-enabled smartphone), butstill is able to differentiate between people not carrying XG-enabledUEs (i.e., 5G-enabled smartphones) from people carrying XG-enabled UEsfor high performance communication.

FIGS. 4A, 4B, and 4C, collectively, is a flowchart that illustrates anexemplary method for accelerating user equipment (UE) specificbeamforming for high performance and reliable communication, inaccordance with an embodiment of the disclosure. FIGS. 4A, 4B, and 4Care explained in conjunction with elements from FIGS. 1, 2A, 2B, 2C, 3A,and 3B. With reference to FIGS. 4A, 4B, and 4C, there is shown aflowchart 400 comprising exemplary operations 402 through 434. Theoperations of the method depicted in the flowchart 400 may beimplemented in the edge device 104A (FIG. 2A).

At 402, a surrounding area of the edge device 104A may be sensed. Thecontrol circuitry 214 may be configured to activate a sensing function218 and signal the sensor 222 to start sensing the surrounding area ofthe edge device 104A. Alternatively, in one implementation, the sensingmay be performed by a portion of the first antenna array 210A.

At 404, a three-dimensional (3D) environment representation of thesurrounding area of the edge device 104A may be generated. In animplementation, the control circuitry 214 may be further configured togenerate the 3D environment representation of the surrounding area ofthe edge device 104A.

At 406, the first user 112A may be detected in the surrounding area ofthe edge device 104A sensed by the sensor 222. The control circuitry 214may be configured to detect the first user 112A in the surrounding areaof the edge device 104A sensed by the sensor 222.

At 408, the detected first user 112A may be tracked in the surroundingarea of the edge device 104A based on the sensor 222. The controlcircuitry 214 may be further configured to track the detected first user112A carrying the first UE 106A in the surrounding area of the edgedevice 104A based on the sensor 222. In some implementation, the firstUE 106A in motion may be recognized to be a valid device to receive oneor more services from the edge device 104A. The control circuitry 214may be further configured to recognize the first UE 106A in motion to bea valid device.

At 410, the first antenna array 210A may be controlled to direct thefirst beam of radio frequency (RF) signal having a signal strengthgreater than the first threshold in a first direction 316A of the firstuser 112A being tracked based on the sensor 222. The control circuitry214 may be further configured to control the first antenna array 210A todirect the first beam of RF signal in the first radiation pattern 314Ain the first direction of the first user 112A being tracked based on thesensor 222 to reach the first location 318A of the first user 112A.Operation 410, i.e., the control of the first antenna array 210A todirect the first beam of RF signal, may include one or moresub-operations, simply referred to as operations 410A, 410B, and 410C.At operation 410A, the first radiation pattern 314A may be selected froma plurality of radiation patterns based on a distance of the first user112A from the edge device 104A, where the first radiation pattern isassociated with the first communication range 320A with respect to theedge device 104A. At operation 410B, beamforming may be executed in thefirst radiation pattern 314A selected from the plurality of radiationpatterns to make the directed first beam of RF signal reach to the firstuser 112A that is within the first communication range 320A. Atoperation 410C, the beamforming may be updated to the second radiationpattern 314B from the first radiation pattern 314A to make the directedfirst beam of RF signal reach to the first user 112A, where the secondradiation pattern 314B is associated with the second communication range320B with respect to the edge device 104A. The beamforming may beupdated to the second radiation pattern 314B having the signal strengthgreater than a second threshold when the first user 112A moves to thesecond communication range 320B from the first communication range 320A.In an implementation, it may be also determined that the detected firstuser 112A carries an XG-enabled UE and then distinguish the first user112A who carries the XG-enabled UE from other users devoid of anycorresponding XG-enabled UEs, where the first beam of RF signal may bedirected at an XG-carrier frequency (e.g., 5G NR carrier frequency) onlyat the location of the first user 112A while avoiding directing anybeams of RF signals at the XG-carrier frequency to the other usersdevoid of any corresponding XG-enabled UEs to save power, where the XGrefers to 5G or 6G radio communication.

At 412, a second user 112B may be detected and tracked concurrently withthe first user 112A in the surrounding area of the edge device 104Abased on the sensor 222. The control circuitry 214 may be furtherconfigured to detect and track the second user 112B concurrently withthe first user 112A in the surrounding area of the edge device 104A.

At 414, the control of the first antenna array 210A may be updated suchthat a second beam of RF signal having the signal strength greater thanthe first threshold is directed in the second direction 316B towards thesecond user 112B concomitant to the first beam of RF signal that isdirected in the first direction 316A towards the first user 112A.

At 416, the control of the first antenna array 210A may be updated suchthat one beam of RF signal in a defined radiation pattern (e.g., a broadbeam or a flower beam) is directed to cover the first user 112A as wellas the second user 112B when a first location of the first user 112A iswithin a threshold range of a second location of the second user 112B.

At 418, location coordinates of a plurality of reflective objects in thesurrounding area of the edge device 104A may be determined. The controlcircuitry 214 may be further configured to determine the locationcoordinates of the plurality of reflective objects in the surroundingarea of the edge device 104A.

At 420, the determined location coordinates of the plurality ofreflective objects may be utilized to correlate a radiation pattern ofthe first antenna array 210A to the plurality of reflective objects forimproved directivity of communicated beams of RF signals. The controlcircuitry 214 may be further configured to utilize the determinedlocation coordinates of the plurality of reflective objects to correlatethe radiation pattern of the first antenna array 210A to the pluralityof reflective objects. Moreover, a distance and an angle of the edgedevice 104A from each of a plurality of mobile and stationary objectssurrounding the edge device 104A may be determined.

At 422, local traffic information may be determined in real-time or nearreal-time based on the sensed surrounding area of the edge device 104A.The control circuitry 214 may be further configured to determine thelocal traffic information in real-time or near real-time.

At 424, an assistance request may be communicated to the central cloudserver 102 when one or more defined service continuity criteria are metto cause the central cloud server 102 to instruct the edge device 104Aor another edge device 104B of the plurality of edge devices 104 withspecific initial access information to continue servicing one or moreUEs 106 carried by the first user 112A. The control circuitry 214 may befurther configured to communicate the assistance request to the centralcloud server 102.

At 426, a start time and an end time of a signal blockage may bepredicted for the first UE 106A in motion being serviced by the edgedevice 104A from a second moving object based on a track of the secondmoving object in the surrounding area of the edge device 104A. Thecontrol circuitry 214 predicts the start time and the end time of thesignal blockage for the first UE 106A in motion being serviced by theedge device 104A from the second moving object. The control moves to428A or 428B based on a defined setting at the edge device 104A.

At 428A, an alert of the predicted signal blockage for the first UE 106Amay be communicated to the central cloud server 102 along with thepredicted start time and the end time of the signal blockage to causethe central cloud server 102 to instruct another edge device of theplurality of edge devices 104 with specific initial access informationto continue servicing the first UE 106A. The control circuitry 214 maybe further configured to communicate the alert to the central cloudserver 102.

At 428B, an alert of the predicted signal blockage for the first UE 106Amay be communicated to another edge device of the plurality of edgedevices 104 along with at least the predicted start time of the signalblockage and a specific initial access information to cause the otheredge device to continue servicing the first UE 106A. The controlcircuitry 214 may be further configured to communicate the alert of thepredicted signal blockage to another edge device of the plurality ofedge devices 104.

At 430, sensing information may be periodically communicated to thecentral cloud server 102 based on the sensed surrounding area of theedge device 104A. The control circuitry 214 may be further configured toset an offline mode or a connected mode at the edge device 104A, whereinin the connected mode, the control circuitry 214 may be furtherconfigured to periodically communicate sensing information to thecentral cloud server 102 based on the sensed surrounding area of theedge device 104A. The sensing information may comprise a distance and anangle of the edge device 104A from each of a plurality of objectssurrounding the edge device 104A, a position of the edge device 104A, alocation and a moving direction of a plurality of UEs including thefirst UE 106A, a time-of-day, local traffic information, local roadinformation, local construction information, a local traffic lightinformation, and local weather information. The central cloud server 102may be configured to predict a travel path of the edge device 104A(e.g., the repeater device 302) and the first UE 106A in motion whenboth the edge device 104A and the first UE 106A are co-located in avehicle. The central cloud server 102 may be further configured tocommunicate one or more alternative wireless connectivity options to theedge device 104A (e.g., the repeater device 302) where the one or morealternative wireless connectivity options are used by the edge device104A as well as the first UE 106A as fallback options to maintainconsistent wireless connectivity to a base station in a case where theprimary connection is lost. An example of the exemplary aspect relatedto the alternative wireless connectivity options has been described inFIG. 3A.

At 432, wireless connectivity enhanced information may be obtained fromthe central cloud server 102 based on the location of the edge device104A in the connected mode. The control circuitry 214 may be furtherconfigured to obtain the wireless connectivity enhanced information viathe one or more donor antenna arrays 206 from the central cloud server102 based on the location of the edge device 104A in the connected mode.The wireless connectivity enhanced information may include the specificinitial access information to bypass an initial access-search on theedge device 104A.

At 434, a response may be received from the central cloud server 102whether or not a handover is required for the edge device 104A for oneor more UEs based on the communicated sensing information. The controlcircuitry 214 may be further configured to receive the response from thecentral cloud server 102 whether a handover is required or not for theedge device 104A for one or more UEs of the plurality of UEs based onthe communicated sensing information.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart that illustrates an exemplary method forsensor-assisted beamforming for accelerating UE specific beamforming forhigh performance and reliable communication, in accordance with anotherembodiment of the disclosure. FIG. 5 is explained in conjunction withelements from FIGS. 1, 2A, 2B, 2C, and 3B. With reference to FIG. 5 ,there is shown a flowchart 500 comprising exemplary operations 502through 512. The operations of the method depicted in the flowchart 500may be implemented in the edge device 104A (FIG. 2A).

At 502, a surrounding area of the edge device 104A may be sensed. Thesensor 222 may be configured to sense the surrounding area of the edgedevice 104A.

At 504, the first user 112A may be detected in the surrounding area ofthe edge device 104A sensed by the sensor 222. The control circuitry 214may be configured to detect the first user 112A in the surrounding areaof the edge device 104A sensed by the sensor 222.

At 506, a location of the detected first user 112A may be tracked in thesurrounding area of the edge device 104A based on the sensor 222. Thecontrol circuitry 214 may be further configured to track the location ofthe detected first user 112A in the surrounding area of the edge device104A based on the sensor 222.

At 508, the first antenna array 210A may be controlled to direct a firstbeam of radio frequency (RF) signal at the location of the first user112A being tracked based on the sensor 222. The control circuitry 214may be further configured to control the first antenna array 210A todirect a first beam of radio frequency (RF) signal at the location ofthe first user 112A being tracked based on the sensor 222. In animplementation, it may be also determined that the detected first user112A carries an XG-enabled UE and then distinguish the first user 112Awho carries the XG-enabled UE from other users devoid of anycorresponding XG-enabled UEs, where the first beam of RF signal may bedirected at an XG-carrier frequency (e.g., 5G NR carrier frequency) onlyat the location of the first user 112A while avoiding directing anybeams of RF signals at the XG-carrier frequency to the other usersdevoid of any corresponding XG-enabled UEs to save power, where the XGrefers to 5G or 6G radio communication.

At 510, a location of the second user 112B may be detected and trackedconcurrently with the first user 112A in the surrounding area of theedge device 104A based on the sensor 222. The control circuitry 214 maybe further configured to detect and track the location of the seconduser 112B concurrently with the first user 112A.

At 512, the control of the first antenna array 210A may be updated suchthat a second beam of RF signal is directed in the second direction 316Btowards the second user 112B to reach the second user 112B concomitantto the first beam of RF signal that is directed in the first direction316A towards the first user 112A to reach the first user 112A. Thecontrol circuitry 214 may be further configured to update the control ofthe first antenna array 210A.

Various embodiments of the disclosure may provide a non-transitorycomputer-readable medium having stored thereon computer-implementedinstructions that, when executed by a computer, causes a communicationapparatus to execute operations that include sensing a surrounding areaof the communication apparatus. The operations further comprisedetecting a first user (e.g., the first user 112A) in the surroundingarea of the communication apparatus. The operations further comprisetracking the detected first user in the surrounding area of thecommunication apparatus. The operations further comprise controlling thefirst antenna array 210A to direct a first beam of radio frequency (RF)signal having a signal strength greater than a first threshold in afirst direction of the first user being tracked using a sensor at thecommunication apparatus.

Various embodiments of the disclosure may provide a non-transitorycomputer-readable medium having stored thereon, computer-implementedinstructions that, when executed by a computer, causes the computer toexecute operations that include sensing a surrounding area of an edgedevice (e.g., the edge device 104A) by a sensor (e.g., the sensor 222)of the edge device 104A The operations further comprise detecting afirst user (e.g., the first user 112A) in the surrounding area of theedge device sensed by the sensor. The operations further comprisetracking the location of the detected first user in the surrounding areaof the edge device based on the sensor. The operations further comprisecontrolling the first antenna array 210A of the edge device 104A todirect a first beam of radio frequency (RF) signal at the location ofthe first user being tracked based on the sensor.

While various embodiments described in the present disclosure have beendescribed above, it should be understood that such embodiments have beenpresented by way of example and not limitation. It is to be understoodthat various changes in form and detail can be made therein withoutdeparting from the scope of the present disclosure. In addition to usinghardware (e.g., within or coupled to a central processing unit (“CPU”),microprocessor, microcontroller, digital signal processor, processorcore, system on chip (“SOC”) or any other device), implementations mayalso be embodied in software (e.g., computer-readable code, programcode, and/or instructions disposed of in any form, such as source,object or machine language) disposed for example in a non-transitorycomputer-readable medium configured to store the software. Such softwarecan enable, for example, the function, fabrication, modeling,simulation, description, and/or testing of the apparatus and methodsdescribed herein. For example, this can be accomplished using generalprogram languages (e.g., C, C++), hardware description languages (HDL)including Verilog HDL, VHDL, and so on, or other available programs.Such software can be disposed of in any known non-transitorycomputer-readable medium, such as semiconductor, magnetic disc, oroptical disc (e.g., CD-ROM, DVD-ROM, etc.). The software can also bedisposed of as computer data embodied in a non-transitorycomputer-readable transmission medium (e.g., solid-state memory anyother non-transitory medium including digital, optical, analog-basedmedium, such as removable storage media). Embodiments of the presentdisclosure may include methods of providing the apparatus describedherein by providing software describing the apparatus and subsequentlytransmitting the software as a computer data signal over a communicationnetwork including the internet and intranets.

It is to be further understood that the system described herein may beincluded in a semiconductor intellectual property core, such as amicrocontroller (e.g., embodied in HDL) and transformed to hardware inthe production of integrated circuits. Additionally, the systemdescribed herein may be embodied as a combination of hardware andsoftware. Thus, the present disclosure should not be limited by any ofthe above-described exemplary embodiments but should be defined only inaccordance with the following claims and their equivalents.

What is claimed is:
 1. An edge device, comprising: a first antennaarray; a sensor configured to sense a surrounding area of the edgedevice; and control circuitry configured to: detect a first user in thesurrounding area of the edge device sensed by the sensor; track thedetected first user in the surrounding area of the edge device based onthe sensor; and control the first antenna array to direct a first beamof radio frequency (RF) signal having a signal strength greater than afirst threshold in a first direction of the first user being trackedbased on the sensor.
 2. The edge device according to claim 1, whereinthe sensor is one of: a sensing Radar, an image sensing device, acombination of the sensing Radar and the image sensing device, or anobject detection sensor.
 3. The edge device according to claim 1,wherein the control of the first antenna array to direct the first beamof RF signal comprises selecting a first radiation pattern from aplurality of radiation patterns based on a distance of the first userfrom the edge device, wherein the first radiation pattern is associatedwith a first communication range with respect to the edge device.
 4. Theedge device according to claim 3, wherein the control of the firstantenna array to direct the first beam of RF signal comprises executingbeamforming in the first radiation pattern selected from the pluralityof radiation patterns to make the directed first beam of RF signal reachto the first user that is within the first communication range.
 5. Theedge device according to claim 4, wherein the control of the firstantenna array to direct the first beam of RF signal comprises updatingthe beamforming to a second radiation pattern from the first radiationpattern to make the directed first beam of RF signal reach to the firstuser, wherein the second radiation pattern is associated with a secondcommunication range with respect to the edge device, and wherein thebeamforming is updated to the second radiation pattern having the signalstrength greater than a second threshold when the first user moves tothe second communication range from the first communication range. 6.The edge device according to claim 1, wherein the control circuitry isfurther configured to detect and track a second user concurrently withthe first user in the surrounding area of the edge device based on thesensor.
 7. The edge device according to claim 6, wherein the controlcircuitry is further configured to update the control of the firstantenna array such that a second beam of RF signal having the signalstrength greater than the first threshold is directed in a seconddirection towards the second user concomitant to the first beam of RFsignal that is directed in the first direction towards the first user.8. The edge device according to claim 6, wherein the control circuitryis further configured to update the control of the first antenna arraysuch that one beam of RF signal in a defined radiation pattern isdirected to cover the first user as well as the second user when a firstlocation of the first user is within a threshold range of a secondlocation of the second user.
 9. The edge device according to claim 1,wherein the sensing of the surrounding area of the edge device isexecuted in a first frequency by the sensor that is different from asecond frequency used to direct the first beam of RF signal from thefirst antenna array.
 10. The edge device according to claim 1, whereinthe control circuitry is further configured to: determine locationcoordinates of a plurality of reflective objects in the surrounding areaof the edge device; and utilize the determined location coordinates ofthe plurality of reflective objects to correlate a radiation pattern ofthe first antenna array to the plurality of reflective objects.
 11. Theedge device according to claim 1, wherein the control circuitry isfurther configured to determine local traffic information in real-timeor near real-time based on the sensed surrounding area of the edgedevice.
 12. The edge device according to claim 1, wherein the controlcircuitry is further configured to communicate an assistance request toa central cloud server when one or more defined service continuitycriteria are met to cause the central cloud server to instruct the edgedevice or another edge device of a plurality of edge devices withspecific initial access information to continue servicing one or moreuser equipment (UEs) carried by the first user.
 13. The edge deviceaccording to claim 1, wherein the edge device is at least one of: anXG-enabled repeater device, an XG-enabled small cell, an XG-enabledroad-side unit (RSU), wherein XG refers to 5G or 6G radio communication.14. The edge device according to claim 1, wherein the control circuitryis further configured to determine that the detected first user carriesan XG-enabled UE and distinguish the first user who carries theXG-enabled UE from other users devoid of any corresponding XG-enabledUEs, wherein the first beam of RF signal is directed at an XG-carrierfrequency at the location of the first user while avoiding directing anybeams of RF signals at the XG-carrier frequency to the other usersdevoid of any corresponding XG-enabled UEs, and wherein XG refers to 5Gor 6G radio communication.
 15. An edge device, comprising: a firstantenna array; a sensor configured to sense a surrounding area of theedge device; and control circuitry configured to: detect a first user inthe surrounding area of the edge device sensed by the sensor; track alocation of the detected first user in the surrounding area of the edgedevice based on the sensor; and control the first antenna array todirect a first beam of radio frequency (RF) signal at the location ofthe first user being tracked based on the sensor.
 16. The edge deviceaccording to claim 15, wherein the control of the first antenna array todirect the first beam of RF signal comprises selecting a first radiationpattern from a plurality of radiation patterns based on a distance ofthe first user from the edge device, wherein the first radiation patternis associated with a first communication range with respect to the edgedevice.
 17. The edge device according to claim 16, wherein the controlof the first antenna array to direct the first beam of RF signalcomprises executing beamforming in the first radiation pattern selectedfrom the plurality of radiation patterns to make the first beam of RFsignal to be directed in a first direction of the first user to reachthe first user present in the first communication range.
 18. The edgedevice according to claim 17, wherein the control of the first antennaarray to direct the first beam of RF signal comprises updatingbeamforming to a second radiation pattern from the first radiationpattern to make the directed first beam of RF signal reach to the firstuser, wherein the second radiation pattern is associated with a secondcommunication range with respect to the edge device, and wherein thebeamforming is updated to the second radiation pattern when the firstuser moves to the second communication range from the firstcommunication range.
 19. The edge device according to claim 15, whereinthe control circuitry is further configured to detect and track alocation of a second user concurrently with the first user in thesurrounding area of the edge device based on the sensor.
 20. The edgedevice according to claim 19, wherein the control circuitry is furtherconfigured to update the control of the first antenna array such that asecond beam of RF signal is directed in a second direction towards thesecond user to reach the second user concomitant to the first beam of RFsignal that is directed in a first direction towards the first user toreach the first user.
 21. The edge device according to claim 15, whereinthe control circuitry is further configured to determine that thedetected first user carries an XG-enabled UE and distinguish the firstuser who carries the XG-enabled UE from other users devoid of anycorresponding XG-enabled UEs, wherein the first beam of RF signal isdirected at an XG-carrier frequency at the location of the first userwhile avoiding directing any beams of RF signals at the XG-carrierfrequency to the other users devoid of any corresponding XG-enabled UEs,and wherein XG refers to 5G or 6G radio communication.
 22. A method ofradar-assisted beamforming, the method comprising: sensing, by a sensorof an edge device, a surrounding area of the edge device; detecting, bycontrol circuitry of the edge device, a first user in the surroundingarea of the edge device sensed by the sensor; tracking, by the controlcircuitry, the detected first user in the surrounding area of the edgedevice based on the sensor; and controlling, by the control circuitry, afirst antenna array of the edge device to direct a first beam of radiofrequency (RF) signal having a signal strength greater than a firstthreshold in a first direction of the first user being tracked based onthe sensor.